Spira's Dream
by M'jai
Summary: Tidus returns to Yuna and the gang, but how? Why? Is he real this time? Or is he still a dream? Does his return foreshadow something else? To find answers, they must return to the Farplane. But the answers they seek are more complicated than they seem.
1. Chapter 1: Homecoming

**Spira's Dream**

_Final Fantasy X2_ transcript translated/retold by M'jai; Original content written by M'jai

Written 7/2005

Re-uploaded and revised:

31 May 2010

19 April 2019

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Disclaimer:

The setting, characters, and inspiration for the plot all belong to Square Enix. Some dialog is taken from game clips of _Final Fantasy X2_. Fans of the game will recognize which content is not mine, so I do not even pretend to take credit for it. My appreciation goes out to Square Enix and their wonderful game designers for giving us such inspiring entertainment.

Scenes retold from the movie clips are mostly my own translations of the Japanese game. So if my version doesn't match your version, ... that's why.

Any resemblance between my fan-fic and other FFX2 fan-fics is purely unintentional. We are all playing the same game, after all, so it's easy to draw some similar theories out of it. Hopefully, it will pack a few new surprises, though.

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Chapter 1: Homecoming

"Are you real?" Yuna hugged Tidus tightly.

"Maybe," he answered softly with uncertainty.

Yuna released her hold and stepped back to survey him. Hesitant, she placed her palms against his chest and pressed. He was solid.

Tidus could guess what she was thinking. She did not pass through him this time. His clothing was cold and wet, but his skin was warm and already beginning to dry. He seemed real enough, however, she had been fooled once before by his surreal existence, ... and so had he. She so badly wanted to believe this was real. "Do I pass?" His brows rose with a measure of anxiety. He couldn't trust his own senses to know whether he was alive or not. Was he transparent still? Did he even look like himself anymore? The memory of fading from reality was still too fresh to take anything for granted.

"Mh." Yuna nodded with smile of approval. "You're back."

"I'm home." A wave of emotion overwhelmed him, as he pulled her to his chest, wrapping one arm over her shoulders and the other around her waist. "I'm home!" he repeated with a broken voice. Burying his face into the base of her neck, he hugged her again for a long moment and struggled to control the mist in his eyes. Having been ridiculed by his dad for being a crybaby when he was younger, he refused to let anyone see tears now, even if they were tears of joy.

With a sigh of relief, allowing herself to be wholly engulfed in his embrace, Yuna wrapped her arms around his torso. "Welcome home."

Rikku and a woman with short gray hair grinned to each other where they stood on the landing ramp watching the couple's mysterious, but long-awaited reunion. Tidus wondered who the other woman was until a very familiar voice called out to them from the beach.

"Hey! Please, some other place, gah!" Wakka yelled in mock disgust.

The entire island of Besaid had joined him there.

"Yo!" Wakka called out again with a grin and a wave.

It gave Tidus the excuse he needed to blink away any remnants of tears and smile again. "Don't bother me, alright!" He gestured for him to go away.

"Uh?" Wakka spread his arms in mock confusion and looked over his shoulder to Lulu with a chuckle.

Lulu cradled a baby in her arms and flashed a wane smile at Wakka for his teasing, as if he deserved the curt response.

"Oi!" Rikku called from the ship's ramp and waved to those on the shore.

"Mh." Tidus took Yuna's hand, urging her to jog with him toward the shore from the sandbar in the water where they stood beneath the airship. As she splashed in the water behind him, Yuna's relief melted into unbridled happiness, and she soon took the lead.

"Oh! Uhwa!" Tidus complained with a laugh, as he stumbled keeping up. He was surprised at the normally shy girl's boldness. "I see you've changed!"

"Well, because a lot has happened!" she told him above the noise of their splashing.

"I want to hear about it!"

"Well, for starters, I found a sphere of you." Her eyes began to water, and she lost her voice for a moment. "At least, ... I thought it was you." Stopping on the water's edge, she turned to face him again.

Now he had no idea what she was thinking, but whatever was on her mind moved her enough to no longer hold back the tears.

"I feel so silly for crying. I'm happy you're back. I really am. It's just ... I've missed you so much." She used her fingers to dry her eyes.

Understanding exactly how she felt, Tidus pulled her head to his shoulder to shield her from the crowd running their way. This was a private moment, however brief.

Yuna squeezed her eyes shut, clearing them of the remaining moisture, then straightened with a sniffle and wiped her lashes before smiling at the oncoming throng.

The crowd cheered their return and welcomed them with hugs as they circled around.

Rikku and the gray-haired woman jumped from the landing ramp into the water and ran to the shore behind them.

"Who do you think you are just popping in on us out of nowhere, ya?" Wakka scolded Tidus, hooking a strong arm around his neck and giving his unruly, wet head a knuckle scrub. "Where you been the last two years?"

"Two years?" Tidus was stunned. Had it been that long? He laughed and pulled away from the head lock in time to receive a gentle hug from Lulu. "I ... It's kind of hard to say." That's when he noticed the baby in her arms had stark red hair. Shocked, but not needing any further explanation, he looked to Wakka. "So, _this_ is why you wanted to retire from blitzball?"

"Hey, now. That's the future star player of the Besaid Auroch's you're looking at, ya?" Wakka proudly grinned before turning to Yuna. "Sorry we couldn't make it to Luca to hear everyone's speeches about what happened, but we got word through the Youth League that the machina had been defeated. Let's have a big bonfire tonight in the village, so everyone can welcome _Yuna_ home!" he suggested to the crowd, giving Tidus a sly glance.

Tidus chuckled at the dig, as a cheer went up from the crowd.

"Meanwhile, you come dry off at our place and give us the scoop on what's been happening," Wakka added.

Lulu greeted Yuna with a hug and a smile, careful not to bump the sleeping baby in her arms. "So, it _was_ him - that sphere you showed me."

"No. But it led me to him all the same."

The crowd began to move away from the shore back toward the village.

Tidus took Yuna's hand and followed.

"The rest of the crew will be coming later." Rikku hopped on one foot trying to pull off a sneaker and pour out some ocean water.

"Brother's being an idiot right now and everyone's having to calm him down," the gray-haired woman explained.

Yuna stopped with mild concern.

"It's nothing for you to worry about." Rikku pushed her shoulders forward, encouraging her to keep walking. "Someone else needs your attention now."

The gray-haired woman smirked. "Nothing like having a rival appear on the scene when you thought you had the playing field all to yourself."

Yuna's expression fell. "But I remember the conversation I accidentally overheard in the cabin between Brother and Barkeep. He never spoke directly to me about it, but I didn't mean for him to feel -"

"Just ignore him. He'll get over it." Rikku continued pushing Yuna forward, not allowing her to spoil the fun by returning to the ship to check on their self-proclaimed, pouting leader.

Tidus found himself and Yuna swept along with the well-wishers down the road to the village. Once there, everyone scattered to their homes to begin preparations for the celebration. Wakka and Lulu led the way to their tiny hut in front of the Besaid temple. It was warmed by the sun, scented with fresh fruit, and cooled with a gentle, tropical breeze - a cozy little place for the new family and their guests to escape the public eye for a moment.

Yuna removed her water-logged boots and set them by the door next to everyone else's upon entering.

Lulu placed the baby on the bed and surrounded him with pillows to keep him from rolling off as she unwrapped him from his blanket pod. He was just beginning to wake, and his little face pinched into a very big yawn as he stretched, kicked, and blinked his eyes. "Wakka, why don't you get the boy a towel and some clothes so he can dry off."

Wakka scratched his head. "You're already changing Vidina's diaper, ya?"

She returned a flat expression. "I was referring to Tidus."

"Oh, so!" Wakka laughed at his own misunderstanding and went to his dresser. "Say, how'd you get back to here, anyway? I know you're a good blitzer and all, but don't tell me you've been holding your breath under water for two years. Here, put these on." He tossed some clothes at Tidus's chest. "We can't have you running around _nekkid_, ya?"

"Though there's those among us who might think that's not such a bad thing. Right, Yunie?" Rikku winked and nudged the summoner.

Yuna's blue and green eyes widened, and one hand went to her cheek as she blushed.

Tidus opened his mouth to answer Rikku, but Wakka intercepted the inevitably egotistical remark by turning him toward the screen. "Well, none of the rest of us are _that_ glad to see him."

"You're just jealous because you've gotten tubby since retiring from blitzball." The petite, strawberry-blond thief poked a finger into the large man's slightly expanding waistline.

"That's _extra presence_ I told ya," Wakka insisted.

Yuna laughed lightly to cover her embarrassment, but her eyes followed Tidus to the screen before she turned her attention to the baby on the bed.

"So, are you going to tell us what happened, or are you going to make us wait until the bonfire, along with the rest of the village?" Lulu asked of Yuna.

"You mean with Vegnagun?"

"That and Tidus's reappearance."

Tidus pulled off his wet, yellow shirt behind the screen and tossed it aside. He used the towel to dry himself, then gave the shirt from Wakka a sniff and made a face. Over the top of the screen, he saw the gray-haired woman sit on the sofa behind the small table. Not bothering to lace the neckline of the white, sleeveless tank with bold, tribal designs, he draped the fluffy towel over his damp head and shoulders and left it there as he changed out of his shorts into a pair of white ones that matched Wakka's shirt.

"Vegnagun has been destroyed," Yuna announced.

"Yeah, we kicked its butt!" Rikku demonstrated a karate kick.

"Down, girl." The gray-haired woman grabbed the back of Rikku's shorts and pulled her down to sit beside her before she accidentally kicked over something valuable in the small hut.

"Shuyin is resting now," Yuna thoughtfully added. "And Vegnagun shouldn't be a problem to Spira anymore."

"What's a ... Vegnagun?" Tidus asked from behind the screen.

"A giant weapon created during the Machina War." The gray-haired woman leaned back and crossed her legs. "But since it proved unreliable distinguishing friend from foe, it was hidden under Bevelle. Shuyin was going to destroy Spira with it. Destroying the world was his answer to purging hatred from it."

"Sounds like Maester Seymour's method of solving Spira's problems - killing everyone in order to have peace." Tidus rubbed the fluffy towel over his head, attempting to dry his hair.

"Maester Seymour probably had some influence on his final plans, considering the sphere in which Baralai asked Maester Seymour to hide him," Yuna quietly agreed. "That sphere left more questions than answers."

"Shuyin even tainted the aeons with his hatred, and they brought fiends into the temples. It was awful!" Rikku exclaimed. "But YuRiPa kicked their butts. Yep, yep, yep!" She grinned.

"YuRiPa?" Tidus picked up his wet clothing and came from behind the screen.

"Us," the gray-haired woman translated.

"Oh. Who's Shuyin?"

"He's the one in the sphere - the one that I thought was you," Yuna explained.

"He looks like me?"

"Uncannily so," Lulu agreed, lifting the baby onto her lap as she sat on the bed. "And what about you? What's your story? How did you manage to come back?"

"I ... don't know," Tidus admitted with a shrug. "I just woke up and found myself in the ocean."

Lulu stood and passed the baby to Yuna as she sat next to her on the bed. The sorceress then took the wet clothing from Tidus to hang on a small bamboo rack in the sunny breeze by the door. "Are you real this time?"

Tidus looked to Yuna with uncertainty. Even if he had passed her inspection, the truth of the matter was that he still didn't know.

"He must be real this time." Yuna lightly bounced the baby on her knee. "When Vegnagun was destroyed, as I was leaving the Farplane, I heard a whistle. The spirit of Bahamut appeared and thanked me. He asked if I heard it, so I knew I wasn't imagining things, and then he asked me if ... I wanted to walk with you again." She looked from the red-headed baby to Tidus.

"And you told him no, but he dumped me on you anyway," he playfully guessed, peering at her from under the towel. "Sucks to be you, huh?"

She couldn't help but be amused, but as he removed the towel from his head to his shoulders, her breath caught.

Tidus appraised himself in the dresser mirror. Wakka's white, island attire contrasted starkly against his sun-kissed skin and brought out the white highlights that streaked his moppish, golden hair. Two years, yet he looked exactly the same?

Clearing her throat in mild embarrassment, Yuna retraced her words, trying to remember what she was going to say. "He promised me they would do what they could."

"So, you're really here," Rikku concluded.

"Just like he promised," Yuna added with a broad, happy smile.

"But if the fayth brought him back, that would make him a dream again, wouldn't it?" Lulu arranged the wet shoes in the sun by the door, and then stood before Tidus to inspect him closely. Nothing slipped past her intelligent, crimson eyes.

"Cut it out, Lu," Wakka complained. "You're raining on everyone's parade bringing this up. Who cares if he's real or not? He's here, ain't he?"

"I'm sorry," she apologized to Tidus. "It's not my intent to put you on the spot about your existence. We're all very glad to see you again. It's just that … when we killed the aeons after defeating Sin, I thought we had also ended their dream. That's why you faded," she stated the obvious. "It's a bit unsettling to know they might still be dreaming again, because that was the whole reason for sending them - to end their eternal summoning. It was the only way to prevent Yu Yevon from coming back with a new Sin. If they were sent, how could they bring you back? For that matter, how was Shuyin able to bring them back and poison them with hate? If the aeons, the fayth, and their dream have returned, will Sin also return?"

"It's okay, Lu." Tidus continued drying his hair with the towel. "I understand your concern. I wish I could give you answers, but I got nothing. After I faded, I'm not sure what happened. I saw my dad, along with Auron and Lord Braska. And it was like they never left Zanarkand." He hung the towel over the divided screen and looked toward Yuna, who looked surprised to hear of his meeting with her deceased father. Tidus moved to the chair beside the sofa where Rikku and Paine sat. Lowering himself into it, he ran his fingers through his shaggy, damp hair, half-heartedly combing it. "They congratulated me for destroying Sin - for freeing my old man. Not so much in words, but I could feel it."

"Lord Braska and Auron were real people. Are you saying that you saw them in the dream, or in the Farplane?" Lulu gently reminded him of the differences between the world he came from and reality.

"I don't know." Tidus felt frustrated that it was the only answer he was able to give. "When Sin first brought me here, I thought I had time-traveled into the future, or something - the way everyone was talking about Zanarkand being in ruins for a thousand years. But this time, I don't remember going back. Sin destroyed dream Zanarkand that night, so I don't know if there would be anything left to go back to, even if I could."

Lulu placed a hand on his shoulder, letting him know she had not meant for her questions to upset him.

"Actually, we all thought you was a little touched in the head after getting too close to Sin." Wakka twirled a finger at his temple.

Tidus chuckled, knowing it was Wakka's way of trying to lighten the mood.

The gray-haired woman didn't quite know what to make of this conversation. "So, you're saying … you're from a dream created by the fayth over a thousand years ago, when Zanarkand was still alive?"

Tidus lifted his chin to meet the gaze of Yuna's newest friend. Beneath that short, silver-gray hair, she had crimson eyes that reminded him of Lulu, more because of the quiet intelligence they seemed to hold than the color. He nodded reluctantly at her assessment of his former situation.

The woman's black leather armor crinkled lightly as she leaned forward, intrigued by how real he seemed. "That's one heck of a dream."

Rikku dropped her chin into her hands and placed her elbows on her knees. "Aw, come on you guys. You're making Tidus feel bad. There's nothing he can do about where he came from or what he is. We should just be glad he was able to come back." She pouted for a moment. "I'm with Yunie on this one. Who cares whether he's real or not? He's back, and that's all that matters."

"It's okay." Tidus sighed and stood. "I understand Lu's concerns. To be honest, I wish I knew for sure myself. But I didn't even know the truth last time, until the fayth told me."

"Well, perhaps there is a way to find out," Lulu suggested.

All eyes turned toward her.

"Return to the Farplane and ask."

Yuna's shoulder-length, mouse-brown hair made a soft swishing sound as she firmly shook her head. "No."

Lulu moved to her side and reached for the baby. The sorceress's long, black braids spilled over one shoulder until she straightened and placed Vidina on the other. "The guado have returned to Guadosalam. They can probably help with his safety while you use their portal. It may be the only way to test whether he has become real, or if he is still part of the dream."

"I don't care." The young summoner stood and paced to the door, folding her arms at her chest. "What if something happens, so that he can't come back again? Taking him to the Farplane to see if he disappears again is not a risk worth taking. He should be allowed to stay forever this time, if he wants to. Why are we even discussing this? He's only just returned."

Tidus approached from behind, placing his hands on her shoulders. "Yuna, nothing lasts forever - not even in your reality. Whether I'm real or not, all we have is the time between here and there. That's all anyone ever has," he spoke softly. "Lu's right. If there's a way to do it, I should try to find out the truth about who, or what, I am now - for your sake, as well as mine."

Yuna didn't seem convinced. She stared through the crack in the door curtains at the lighting of the bonfire in the center of the village, watching the smoke and ash rise into the air like charred pyreflies. By sunset the flames would be as big as the summoning circle itself.

Tidus gave the matter some more thought and leaned against the door post. "After I faded, every now and then, I would get this feeling you were reaching out for me. So, I'd whistle hoping you'd hear."

"When I was lost in the Farplane, I followed your whistle to find the way out. I could swear that I saw you."

"There. You see? We're connected." He smiled. "I'll always be with you in one way or another." When she didn't respond, the smile faded. "Wouldn't you want to know the truth, if you were me?"

Rubbing a chill from her arms, as if the warm island breeze suddenly felt cold, she turned to face him, but didn't look happy.

"And though it hasn't been a whole decade yet, my return could somehow mean the end of what we thought would be an Eternal Calm. Sphere hunters search all over Spira hunting for clues to the truth about Spira's past because, as a people, you don't know very much of your own history. Yuna … you know it's the right thing to do."

She searched his azure eyes with sadness. "But why does doing the right thing always hurt so much?"

He gently took her into his arms again. "I don't know that, either."

"If it's what you really want, we'll go to Guadosalam and ask to use their portal," she quietly agreed. Then she pulled back and pointed a stern finger at his nose. "But if any part of you starts to fade, we leave _immediately_."

Tidus smiled. "Yes, ma'am!"

Rikku bounced off the sofa. "Woohoo! We can fly to Guadosalam tomorrow morning, first thing!"

Tidus waved his hands. "No! Uh, Rikku, no offense, but ... it's been two years since I left. I want to see what I've missed. If all I have is the time between now and then, I'd like 'then' to last a little more than a day. Maybe the ship could take us island hopping, but allow us to go on foot from the Mi'ihen High Road. Would that be all right?"

"Sure! Can we come with?" She hopped to Tidus's side.

"Rikku." The gray-haired woman frowned slightly at the younger girl for not minding her own business.

"Well, he's my friend, too, you know. Yunie's not the only one that missed him," Rikku pouted.

Touched by Rikku's unexpected plea, Yuna looked to Wakka and Lulu. They had been a tight-knit group on the pilgrimage to defeat Sin - the summoner and her guardians. These were the people who were willing to die to protect her until she could accomplish her goal at the final summoning. "I would be honored to have my friends accompany us and make sure we get there safely, ... making memories along the way, like we did before." Yuna glanced at Tidus to be sure it was okay with him.

He shrugged with an easy-going smile. "It's okay with me." He punctuated his decision by elbowing Rikku aside, as if she were a pest for asking.

Rikku giggled and bumped him back with her hip, nearly knocking him into Yuna.

Wakka chuckled at their interaction. "Well, I know I haven't said much, but I've felt like I lost two little brothers, the way the Farplane claimed both you and Chappu. It's good to have my little buddy back." With a clap, he changed his tune. "And now that all that is settled, and Lu is done popping everyone's balloons, maybe we can have a celebration around here, ya?" He rubbed his strong hands together, ready for some food and fun.

"Right," Lulu agreed with a smile, again offering a nod in apology to Tidus and Yuna for being, perhaps, overly concerned about extenuating circumstances. "What are your favorite foods? I'll fix them tonight for the festivities."

Rikku suddenly had visions of tables full of desserts. "Oooh, how about some palm fruit pies and some berry swirlies and some -"

"She's not asking you. You'd eat her out of house and home." The gray-haired woman interrupted and stood to approach Tidus. "I'm Paine. It's nice to finally meet you. I'll go see what's keeping the rest of the crew and tell them the travel plans. Just be warned about Brother."

"Brother?" He side-stepped to let her pass.

Rikku leaned back, clasping her hands behind her head in a stretch. "He's probably still pouting that you've returned because he's got this really big crush on Yunie."

"In a jealous fit, he's more likely to hurt himself than you, trust me. But we don't want him to pounce you without warning." Paine smirked, then bowed to Lulu and Wakka, excusing herself from their small home.

Tidus blinked at the mild threat. He remembered Rikku's big brother. ''But ... isn't he your cousin?" he asked of Yuna.

Yuna nodded with embarrassment.

"Okay, ew.'" Tidus made another face.

"Come on you." Wakka hooked an arm around Tidus's neck again. "I gotta borrow him a few minutes to say hello to the guys on the team," he half-apologized to Yuna before dragging him outside.

Once outside, though Wakka was twice his size, Tidus managed to escape the head-lock and jog toward the blitzball team's hut on his own. "Hey! How about a game on the beach, _Tubby_? You up to it?" he called back over his shoulder.

Wakka stopped in his tracks and shook a fist toward him. "Who you calling _Tubby_? You just bring it on, ya! I've changed diapers that look better than your score sheets!"


	2. Chapter 2: Rivalry

Chapter 2: Rivalry

That afternoon at the bonfire festivities, the children of the village begged Yuna to tell them what happened in the Farplane during the attempt to disassemble Vegnagun. As children and adults alike sat down in a circle around her, she became the center of their undivided attention. She was no longer the shy, child-like girl who grew up sheltered by the temple with an unshakable faith in Yevon. Having faced great trials and found great courage in her travels, Yuna now had a greater sense of who she could be.

Tidus sat next to Wakka and watched Yuna's face light with expression and emotion as she related the events of the Gullwings most recent mission.

When Vidina started to cry at one point, Wakka accepted the baby from Lulu and lay on his back to "fly" him through the air. This pacified the fussy baby and allowed everyone else to keep listening to the soft-spoken high summoner.

Rikku grinned and moved close, letting the baby grab onto her fingers.

Excited to see her, Vidina started kicking and spat-up on Wakka's chest.

"Aw, maaan," the big man complained in hushed tones and frowned at Rikku. "What'd you make him do that for?" Passing the baby to the small thief, he tried to avoid drawing attention away from Yuna's storytelling as he got up to change his shirt.

Rikku held Vidina at arm's length and winced apologetically at Lulu.

Lulu smiled and passed Rikku a burp cloth.

Yuna saw all of this and more as she spoke without interruption. Her heart warmed with happiness at being reunited with _all_ her friends. It was comforting to know everyone was here, including _him_. When explaining the tale of Shuyin and Lenne, so that their memory could live on with future generations, her eyes drifted to Tidus. Speaking of Shuyin, she remembered the strange mix of loneliness and crushing disappointment she felt upon realizing the person she'd found _wasn't_ Tidus. She had failed her mission to find him using the spheres; but he was able to find his way back to her despite it. That made his return more meaningful than if she had succeeded.

When the storytelling was done, everyone who could brought food out to the bonfire for a potluck meal. Then, Wakka accepted Tidus's challenge and gathered the blitzball team for a game on the beach … for old time's sake. Though the sun was still visible on the horizon, they lit bamboo torches and paper lamps around the perimeter of the area where they would be playing, so they could continue into the night.

"Land, or water?" Tidus volleyed the ball a few times after determining and marking boundaries.

Wakka gave the younger player's stature a studious glance, then gave his own stomach a light pat. "_Land_. See, I think you've been holding out on us, training in the ocean for two years, ya?"

Tidus laughed at that absurd theory. "No, I haven't."

Nearby, Yuna and her friends were humored. "Not even Tidus could hold his breath for that long, Wakka."

"All right, we got some bare feet out here, so that means no shoes come into play! We'll play teams by rounds! Anyone else want in first round?" he called to the spectators gathering around. "Yuna, you want to be on his team?"

Tidus stopped volleying the ball. "Eh?"

"The Gullwings had to take the place for the Aurochs in the exhibition games and a few league games at the first of the season," Wakka explained. "Yuna did pretty good, if I do say so."

Tidus blinked at Yuna. "_You_ played blitzball?"

"Careful, we might have to hurt you if that sounds like doubt," Paine returned in mock threat.

Wakka gave a low chuckle. "You know, ladies, I don't think he believes me. If he doesn't want you on his team, I'd be happy to have you on mine."

"I'll play!" Rikku jumped up from where she sat on the sand.

Paine folded her arms over her chest and nodded, accepting the challenge.

Rikku elbowed Yuna. "Come on, Yunie. It'll be fun."

Yuna responded with a light giggle. "Mmmh, ... okay."

"Okay, but … I won't hold back," Tidus warned.

"Neither will we," Yuna answered.

He quirked a brow of surprise. "Who _are_ you and what did you do with Yuna?"

Clasping her hands behind her back, she rocked onto her toes and stared up at him with inquiry designed to put him on the spot. "Is that a complaint?"

"N-no. I just -"

"Good!" She smiled and turned around to consult her teammates.

"All right, let's get this show on the road, ladies!" Wakka clapped his hands.

"Let's go Gullwings!" Rikku called out. Yuna, Rikku, and Paine gave each other high fives following their huddle.

"Wait, ... how are we going to tell teams apart without uniforms?" Tidus gave the ball a light toss. "In Zanarkand, we sometimes did 'shirts versus no-shirts' for impromptu games on the beach. If you called the challenge, you were automatically the no-shirts team." A cheesy grin crossed his lips. "That would be your team, Wakka." He gave the ball another light toss.

Paine gave his chest a push and caught the ball. "Nice try." Heading to her position on the beach, she drew a result plate from her pocket and touched a marble-sized sphere on it. After changing from her leather attire to shorts, she kicked her boots to the side. Now, she was ready for some serious beach sport.

Wakka drew alongside Tidus's shoulder. "Ooh. I'm kinda sorry that one didn't work out, ya?" But then he thumped the back of Tidus's head for suggesting such a thing.

"_Atch_ …" Tidus winced and rubbed the spot where he'd been thumped as Wakka jogged toward the center of their sand arena.

Laughing lightly, Yuna shook her head. Removing her wrap-style gunner skirt, she handed it to Lulu, who sat a safe distance away with the baby on her lap. "Could you hold this please? I don't want to trip on it."

"Yunie!" Rikku ran to her side, looking like the proverbial cat who swallowed a mouse. "Come here, come here! I got a plan!" Taking Yuna's hand, her cousin dragged her toward Paine. Then, the three of them huddled and whispered for a minute or two.

Tidus quirked a brow again. "Plan?"

"Good lords." Cid rolled his eyes to Brother where they stood on the sidelines. "If Rikku's running the show instead of Wakka, there's no telling what kind of defense the boy's going to need."

Stripping out of his shirt and tucking it into the waist of his shorts, Tidus indicated his team was to follow suit. After which, he did a head count and huddled with his team for a brief strategy session, too, just as Buddy jogged in to join the play.

When the players were finally ready, they took their positions on the field and crouched for the tip-off.

Shinra volunteered to referee. "Blitz-off!" he cried out. Then, blowing the whistle, he tossed the ball into the air.

Tidus was the first to nab the ball in play. He immediately cut to the left, but Wakka slammed him from the side and wrestled the ball away. Wakka didn't get far before Letty stole it back and carried it to the outside. Tidus ran wide for a pass, but Wakka dragged him to the ground again. There was a brief struggle before he crawled out from under and escaped his muscular friend, but Tidus sprinted toward Letty, trying for a pass again.

"Tidus!" Yuna called and waved.

He turned.

Rikku and Yuna, did a couple of choreographed steps then turned their backs to him and wiggled their short-shorts in unison.

"Oh -" He stopped in disbelief … until the ball _shwocked_ the side of his head.

"Incomplete pass!" Wakka laughed and followed the fumble with another bone-crunching tackle that sprawled Tidus in the sand.

Laughter bubbled up from the spectators, as well.

Brother stood on the sidelines, speechless.

"What kind of defensive play was that!" Cid fussed as Paine chased and picked up the runaway ball.

"It worked, didn't it?" She had a clear shot toward the canoe that served as the other team's goal, so she took it.

Most of the team members that had seen the play were laughing with everyone else, but Keepa had seen Paine play in Luca a couple of times and kept his focus on her long enough to block her shot.

Tidus scrambled to his feet and marched toward Rikku and Yuna, pointing a finger in accusation. "Okay, that was NOT right! You didn't play like that in the leagues, did you?"

Yuna giggled behind the back of her hand. "Of course not. That was just for you."

"There's nothing in the rule book about dancing during a play." Rikku pointed back, poking him in the chest.

"That wasn't dancing!" he complained. "That was a deliberate cheat!"

"It wasn't a cheat." Pain approached. "A cheat would have been a darkness dance spell. This was only a tactical distraction." She shrugged with a small, curt smile.

Tidus could hear Wakka's boisterous howls behind him and looked over his shoulder in annoyance.

"That look on your face was priceless!" Wakka laughed aloud some more.

Lowing his gaze, Tidus pressed his lips together. When he looked back up, Yuna was laughing, too - genuinely laughing.

She had not laughed like that since the beginning of her pilgrimage.

Her laughter allowed him to chuckle at his own vulnerability. "Okay, okay. It's good to see you laughing again, even if it's at my expense." He stepped backwards toward the initial set up again, wagging a finger at them. "But I see how this is going to be. And I can handle it."

Shinra snickered as Tidus and Wakka repositioned themselves for the next tip-off.

Tidus narrowed his eyes on his friend. "You set me up."

"I didn't do nothing," Wakka defended, still grinning. "They targeted you, and you fell for it."

Amid the chants and cheers from the villagers, Shinra blew the whistle, and threw the ball into a blitz-off again.

This time, Wakka used his mass to shove Tidus aside before the spry, young athlete could jump. The former Auroch's captain claimed the ball first. Tidus had no hope of tackling him, so Wakka ran free until he saw an opening to pass the ball to Rikku. She carried the ball to the right and threw a long pass to Yuna. Catching it, Yuna dodged Buddy's attempt to tackle her and ran toward Paine. Based on what happened the last time the ball fell into Paine's hands, Tidus had to intercept that pass. Sprinting ahead of Yuna, he hopped in front of her. She couldn't stop fast enough to avoid him. So as soon as they collided, he caught her around the waist and swung her over his shoulder. Yuna cried out, laughed, and struggled to hold onto the ball.

"Hey, no fair! You put her down! Yunie!" Rikku raced toward them, but Jassu cut her off and bumped her into the sand.

Seeing his teammate coming, Tidus turned Yuna around, so all Jassu had to do was take the ball from her hands.

Jassu winked, thanking her for the easy steal, then raced toward the goal.

"Put me down!" Yuna laughed, pounding on Tidus's back.

"Wait, not yet! You might want to see this!" He turned her to face the fishing net that served as Wakka's team goal.

Jassu dropped the ball for a kick and shot it into the net.

"Oh! What was that?" Tidus cried out to Wakka and his team. "Was that a goal? Yes! I do believe that was a goal!" He set Yuna back on her feet.

Though still laughing, she gave him a light swat for detaining her like that. Then, brushing her wind-blown hair from her cat-colored eyes, she started to walk away. A tug on her calf-length, braided queue pulled her back. Tidus was holding on with an impish grin.

"Yuna!" Wakka complained. "What'd you give him the ball for?"

Yuna tried to pry her braid out of Tidus's hand. "He was bouncing and swinging me! I couldn't hold onto it well!"

"There's nothing in the rulebook about sweeping a player off her feet." Tidus gave the braid a small twirl before releasing it.

"Oh, come on! That was a holding foul if I ever saw one, ya?" Wakka fussed.

"I wasn't holding; I was lifting! I could have balanced her on one shoulder - no-hands." Tidus briefly demonstrated what that hands-off move might have looked like, before leaving Yuna's side to argue with Wakka about it some more.

Yuna smoothed her braid as she laughed and caught her breath.

Rikku jogged to her side and giggled. "Told you it'd be fun." She waved to Wakka for them to play the next round without them and jogged with Yuna to where Lulu and the rest of the Gullwings crew sat.

Paine took one last look at the guys setting up new teams, chuckled, then followed Rikku and Yuna.

Yuna sat on the sand and fluffed the end of her braid like a lion's tail as Paine sat down with her and Rikku. "You're smiling. You had fun. Admit it."

"Well, don't act like it's a miracle. It was worth it just to see him get slammed from both directions, since he looks so much like Shuyin."

"What in the blue blazes of the Farplane was that?" Cid fussed. "You call that a game strategy?"

"You mean the dance?" Rikku asked.

"Shame ... on ... you! Why don't you just moon the poor boy next time, while you're at it," the older engineer sarcastically suggested. "That way, at least, he'd get by with only a heart attack instead of a two-way concussion."

"Aaaaahhh! No, no, no! No Rikku mooning!" Brother covered his ears, ... then his eyes, then mouth, as if he were going to barf.

Rikku frowned and smacked the back of her brother's head. "It was just a dance to distract him from getting the ball. Don't get your knickers in a bunch. He won anyway. Besides, you usually like to watch Yunie dance."

"Not for _him_!" Brother burst. "He does not deserve Yuna's dances! He ... threw her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes!"

"He was just being silly like the rest of us. We knew he'd do something to get us back."

"He is not silly! He is nothing! He is nothing but a thought, so I will not think of him! He's so nothing, he's not even a ghost!"

"You hush up!" Rikku scolded. "If he's such a nothing, why don't you go play against him, you big chicken?"

"All right. I will." Brother puffed out his chest with determination. "Wakka needs new players for next round. Let's see _Goldilocks_ try to pick _me_ up and swing _me_ around!" And with that, the captain of the Gullwings strode toward the game to offer Wakka his services for sacking Tidus.

"Pffft!" Rikku waved him off and let him go. "Just for that, we should moon _him_," she told Yuna.

"The heck you will!" Cid protested. "No daughter and niece of mine are going out there and -"

"I thought your dance was brilliant," Lulu interrupted, bouncing her baby on her knee. "You may have just changed offensive blitzball tactics forever."

"Really? Thanks." Rikku proudly grinned. "I thought it up myself."

Yuna lifted her gunner skirt into her lap, stared at it for a long moment, then lifted her eyes to the new round of game action. As her eyes followed Tidus on the field, Brother's words echoed in her mind. _Nothing but a thought_ ...

Closing her eyes, Yuna could feel herself being hoisted and jostled onto his shoulder again. She had felt and heard his laughter beneath her. She felt the warmth of his skin under her hands on his back as she watched the goal made with her _fumble_. She had caught the scent of sea water that dried in his hair, making it a little stiff. She had seen the sinewy muscles in his arms contract and relax as he set her gently back on her feet. Tidus wasn't just a thought. He was real. How could he not be this time? How else could he have come back?

"Are you all right?" Paine asked, concerned.

Yuna surfaced from swimming in her thoughts and made herself smile, though her heart was beginning to ache. "I'm fine."

))((

Several hours after sunset, the blitzball game was still going.

Wakka landed hard on his back and lay still for a moment to catch his breath.

Tidus shuffled through the sand and held a hand down to him. "Had enough yet, old man?"

"Are you kidding me? I'm not going to let some young ruffian... knock me down... without a fight," Wakka answered, sucking wind between parts of his complaint. Waving away Tidus's hand, the big man stood on his own and leaned forward, hands on knees, still trying to breathe without labor. Then he reached for the borrowed, white shirt Tidus tucked into the waist of his shorts and jerked it free to pat the sweat from his face.

With a smug expression, Tidus straightened and folded his arms at his chest. "You're already knocked down. You might want to consider losing some of that _presence_ if you want to play ball again."

"Say the word, and I hold him down for you to pummel a lesson into!" Brother offered, coming to Wakka's side.

"I can pummel his little body myself, ya? Emphasis on _little_," Wakka added to Tidus. Wiping his forehead on the shirt again, he straightened and tossed the sweaty shirt into Tidus's face.

Humored, Tidus caught the shirt, but a loud whistle from the side-lines drew his attention to Yuna. The summoner waved at him from where she sat with Lulu and everyone who wasn't playing. Jogging to see what she wanted, he dropped the shirt at their feet and gestured regarding the whistle. "You've been practicing. That sounded sharp."

"Thanks." She was pleased with his approval. "Lulu wanted to ask how much longer you intend to play tonight?"

Tidus shrugged. "No telling. We're not playing match rules, or anything. Besides, Wakka's being stubborn. We've scored six to nothing on him so far, and he still refuses to give in."

"He won't cave until he wins, or he's _injured_," Lulu hinted. "But it's time we all got some rest before he really does _hurt_ himself."

Tidus wiped a bead of sweat running down the side of his face and grinned. "You want me to take him down?"

"Be gentle, though. His body won't heal as quickly as his pride."

"Is that wise?" Paine asked, amused. "Wakka's pretty strong, but Tidus is more agile, and in better shape. He might really hurt him."

"Tidus won't hurt him," Rikku assured her. "He'll just knock him on his butt and then rub it in that he won."

Yuna laughed lightly at how well they knew him.

"Gotcha." Tidus gave Lulu a wink, then jogged back into the game.

Wakka had already taken up his position for the blitz-off.

With the opening toss, Tidus let Wakka reach for the ball first.

))((

"I know how he's going to do it." Yuna smiled. "Remember that high kick that he used to do? He practiced it all the time after Wakka was injured and asked him to take his place as team captain for the season." She closed her eyes, seeing it in her mind. "He always sets it up by going to the far side of the goal and faking a pass."

Wakka caught the ball and ran toward the opposing goal. Brother tried to sandbag Tidus, but Tidus shoved him into Wakka. Dodging the fumble that followed, Tidus grabbed the ball from Wakka, and headed to the far right - nowhere near the goal.

"Then," Yuna continued, "he would throw the ball high."

Wakka growled and sprang to his feet to block. Tidus waited until his big buddy was in just the right place, then he tossed the ball high into the air.

"Then, he would swim after it and flip backwards to do the kick." Yuna opened her eyes.

))((

Tidus sprang high, arching backwards in mid-air to keep his eye on the ball. It was harder to do this move on land because gravity was faster and less forgiving than in water, but he had mastered the maneuver, contacting the ball with expert timing and force. The ball shot toward Wakka's stomach, then rebounded and soared right past the goalie into the fishing net. Tidus landed, crouched on his toes. The top of his bare foot stung like it was on fire, but his heart pounded with excitement. It felt good to be alive again. Amid the cheers for his famous trick shot, he stood and ran to Wakka's side. "Hey, are you okay?"

"I'm fine, I'm fine." Wakka winced as he rolled onto his hands and knees. "Just a little wind knocked out of me, that's all."

"You were in the way of my goal, man."

Wakka accepted help standing this time, hand to his stomach. "You were showing off, brat. That kick's a lethal weapon, ya?"

"Want to quit?" Tidus baited him with a grin.

"_No._ Just 'cos you got some fancy kick all figured out and scored doesn't mean I'm going to hand over the whole game. That won't happen again."

"Okay, then." Tidus shrugged. "Let's blitz!" He slapped Wakka on the back and ran toward the center of their sand arena for another blitz-off.

"Wait a minute! Uh, hold on there."

Tidus stopped and turned to face him. Hands on hips, chin cocked to one side, he waited.

"How about we suspend play - _just for tonight,_" Wakka quickly added. "I mean, you must be really tired from your journey from ... wherever it is you swam here from. We could continue the game when you get back from Guadosalam. It would be a promise, ya? You can't break a promise, so you _have_ to come back and finish it."

With a nod, Tidus smiled. "You're on."


	3. Chapter 3: Troubled Past

Chapter 3: Troubled Past

Wakka waved to his teammates that the game had ended for the evening, then he hooked an elbow around Tidus's neck - this time for support - as they walked back to where the women sat on the shore. He was breathless, sore, and exhausted, but he wasn't about to admit that to anyone. "I think we'll call it a standoff for now," he informed Lulu. "It's getting late, and he has an airship to catch tomorrow. Don't want the boy to be too tuckered out to make that long hike to Guadosalam, ya?"

"We can continue the game when I get back." Tidus gave Lulu a sly wink. "Hey, maybe we could all catch a game in Luca tomorrow. I want to go everywhere that I went before. I don't want to miss a thing this time!"

"Hey, that's a good idea," Wakka agreed. "The Besaid Aurochs aren't in the games yet because they have no captain, but I hear the Luca Goers are being taken down a notch or two this year. Beclam tried to take up the slack with training for a short while, but he was a real nut case. He finally went back to the Youth League and good riddance. Say, you wouldn't seriously consider, uh ..."

"Wakka, he's only just come back." Lulu gave a small nod to Tidus and stood, cradling little Vidina on her shoulder. "It's time to go home and put someone to bed."

Wakka glanced between Tidus and Lulu, suspicious about these little signals they were giving each other, but then he waved off her suggestion. "Ah, the baby's already sound asleep. We can stay out a little longer."

"I was referring to you," she corrected.

"Oh. Heh." He straightened and took her hand. "Well, we can meet you guys in Luca, then. Tomorrow night okay?"

"That sounds like fun." Yuna stood and offered Tidus's shirt back to him.

Lulu and Wakka waved goodnight to everyone as they left for the village.

))((

"That kick should be illegal!" Brother loudly complained.

"Ah, but you wouldn't think that if you knew how to do it. Want to learn?" Tidus countered.

Brother snorted and marched toward the airship.

"Never mind him. That was a good game." Buddy shook Tidus's hand.

"The mathematical precision you used to execute that kick was most impressive," Shinra added.

"Ehhh, thanks." Tidus hadn't realized he used any mathematical precision. "I just waited until it looked right."

"You should consider becoming a professional blitzball player, boy." Cid slapped him on the back in a congratulatory manner. "Not just some fill-in bench warmer for hire."

"Well, I used to be." Tidus shrugged with an uncharacteristic quiet. "Kind of."

"Which team?"

Tidus hesitated to say, but this was Cid. Cid had known him since before he faded. "Zanarka -"

"Oh, right. Forgot about that one." Cid chuckled loudly. "I was thinking about the real teams. I'll bet the Luca Goers would pay a mighty fine sum to add you to their roster with that kick of yours. Surprised you didn't take your foot off at the ankle the way you smoked that ball into the net."

Tidus's expression fell slightly. His Zanarkand team wasn't considered a real team? No, of course not, considering … Nodding and chuckling a bit, he looked down at his sore foot. When he looked up again, Rikku's silent gaze matched his own.

"Uh, gee, Pop, look at the time," Rikku salvaged the moment, returning to her usual perky mood. "It sure is getting late. We'd better go back to the airship and get some sleep if we're going to be island hopping tomorrow."

"You got a place to stay for tonight?" Buddy asked.

"Ah, no, ... actually," Tidus answered with some embarrassment.

"Well, we don't have any spare beds on the ship, but we've got spare space."

"What about Brother?"

Buddy shrugged and started to answer, but Rikku interrupted. "Just ignore him," she sang, hooking her arms around Cid's elbow to lead him back to the airship before he could say anything else that might upset Tidus about his not-so-real past.

Tidus took Yuna's hand and started to follow everyone else back to the airship, but then looked at the shirt in his hand. "Oh! My clothes! I'd better run back to Wakka's and get them."

"I'll come with you," Yuna volunteered. "There are wild animals around here, you know. You shouldn't be walking alone at night."

"See you back on the ship then." Paine ran to catch up with Rikku and the others.

"I think I can handle a coyote, or two, after having faced off against Sin," Tidus answered Yuna, amused at her concern about him walking back to the village alone.

"It's ... not really the animals that concern me." Yuna leaned against him as they waded through the evening tide. "It's probably silly, but I guess there's a part of me that's afraid you'll disappear again, even before we reach Guadosalam."

Tidus stopped and faced her. "I'm not going to fade away again. I _promise_. And since it's a promise, I have to keep it," he declared, borrowing Wakka's strategy for staying optimistic.

Yuna tried to smile, as if wishing that was enough to seal his fate here. Releasing his hand, she placed her fingertips carefully on his bare chest, as she had earlier that day when she found him.

Tidus's brows rose with worry as he watched her try to convince herself that he wasn't a ghost. She was so different now, so much more confident in herself, yet at the same time so much more insecure about him. Placing his hand across both of hers, he pressed them lightly against himself, hoping to reassure her doubts. "Yuna, I have doubts, too. Believe me. But … I don't want to waste precious time being afraid of what might happen."

"I don't know what to believe anymore. But you will always be real to me, no matter what the Farplane reveals."

Drawing closer, Tidus leaned forward and kissed her for a long moment, as he had wanted to do from so far away for so long - as he had that night in the spring two years ago. When he pulled back, she smiled at him, and somehow that made everything better.

"We had better catch Wakka before he goes to sleep."

He nodded in agreement, pulled the white shirt on, and took her hand again before walking a perpendicular line from the beach to the path toward the road that would lead back to the village.

"Were you really a professional blitz player at your age?" Yuna picked up on his conversation with Cid as they strolled together.

Tidus found humor in the way she worded her question. "What do you mean _at your age_? Makes me sound like a baby."

She laughed. "All right then. How old were you when you became a professional blitzer?"

Tidus shrugged. "Sixteen. I know it's really young, but the Abes picked me because my dad had been with them for ... _eons_. Everyone expected me to take his place after he left, and blitzing was kinda the only thing I knew how to do. I was just finishing the end of my first year in the professional leagues when Sin hit Zanarkand and brought me here."

Yuna smiled again. "That means you're nineteen now, right? Just like me?"

"Seventee -," he stopped in mid-correction. It had been two years. Two years had passed that he knew nothing about. "I don't even know how old I am."

Yuna's brows rose with sympathy, but she quickly waved it off. "It doesn't matter. Were you famous?"

"Oh yeah. First as Jecht's son, and then as ... Jecht's son." He chuckled with a shrug.

She chuckled with him.

"I guess being the kid of the most famous blitzer in Spira had its perks sometimes. Kids got excited when I signed their blitz balls. I got to do TV interviews, though they always asked me about my old man at least once. Cute girls mobbed me." He bumped his shoulder playfully against hers.

Yuna laughed and gave him a nudge that nearly pushed him off-balance, but after a moment, she became terribly curious. "Did you ... have a girlfriend?"

Tidus grew quiet trying to think of how to respond to that as they walked up the hill through the grassy ruins to the main road.

"Wait – never mind. You don't have to answer that. It was a nosy question."

"Well, to be honest about it, I can't remember. I think I did, but … I can't remember her face, or her name." His gaze drifted up to the stars overhead. He'd never thought about it before. Yuna was all that mattered to him since meeting her. But now that she asked, he wondered why his memory of something like past girlfriends would fail so completely after only two years.

"What do you remember about your Zanarkand? I've seen it twice in visions now, and it looked so different from the ruins beyond Gagazet."

Tidus used the stars to form a mental visual of the city that never slept. "It was bigger than the eye could see. It reached up into the clouds, and even up on top of the highest building you couldn't see the end of it - or the bottom of it. It had huge, tiered towers with colorful spires and waterfalls. There were wide, stacked levels of highways right up against the buildings with lots of cars and motorbikes."

"Cars?" She tilted her head.

"Vehicles with wheels."

"Like wagons?"

"No. More like ... your airship. Only a lot smaller. They would roll on the highways, but then lift into the air at higher speeds. I was saving up to get a motorbike so I wouldn't have to take the public rail everywhere. And I would have had enough, if I'd been able to stick around long enough to taste that championship gil. But the lights were so bright at night that you couldn't see stars." He stopped on a wooden bridge near the waterfalls and lowered his gaze to her. "Not like this." She was even more beautiful now, under this moonlight, than the way he remembered her in Macalania's crystal woods. Lifting the small, beaded braid of blue hair that she wore beneath her right ear, he tapped the tip of her nose with it. "What is this supposed to be anyway? Sprouting ronso fur?"

She giggled and pushed his hand down as he let it slip through his fingers. "What was your home like?"

He made a face of mild embarrassment. "Well, Auron lived with me on the boat for a while after my mom died, because of my age. But I planned on buying an apartment overlooking the arena someday." He positioned his hands just so, visualizing Zanarkand again. "Short commute to practices - good place to schmooze on dates afterwards."

Yuna laughed and gave him another elbow nudge.

"Hey, that hurts, you know?" But he grinned as he rubbed the spot where he'd been poked.

"Well, then stop telling me about how many girls you were interested in." She started walking again, past the rushing waterfalls.

"All right. I'll tell you about the only one I'm interested in now. She's never even set foot in my Zanarkand. She's from a puny, little, tropical island in the middle of nowhere. And she knows the names and faces of everyone there. They look up to her, not only because she's the daughter of the last high summoner to summon the Final Aeon for the Calm, but because she's friendly ... and smart. Oh, and she's kinda cute, too."

Yuna leaned against his shoulder. "Being sweet won't make up for teasing me about your mobs of girlfriends. And I already know about me; I want to know more about you."

He shrugged, somewhat bashful. "There's not much more to tell."

"Well, who were your friends? What kind of things did you do together?"

Tidus became silent again as they continued up the road toward more ruins that had been taken over by the outskirts of the Besaid jungle. Nameless faces flashed through his mind, ... or rather faceless feelings. Surely he had friends, but why couldn't he remember them? He couldn't even remember team mates that well.

"Did you have any brothers? Sisters?"

He slowly shook his head. "I don't think so."

"You don't know?"

"I ... can't remember."

Yuna's expression reflected what he was thinking, but afraid to admit: his lack of memories was odd. "My questions are making you uncomfortable. Now I feel bad for asking."

"No, don't feel bad. It's just …" The more that he tried to recall people or circumstances from his childhood in Dream Zanarkand, the harder it became to recall anything specific. Was he losing his mind? Tidus stopped at the top of the hill that led down toward the village and turned to face her. "Why can't I remember?"

"Maybe something happened to your memories after you faded."

"But I remember everything about this place. I remember Rikku knocking me out flat after helping me fight off fiends at the underwater temple. I remember Wakka pushing me off a cliff into the water. I remember Kimahri threatening to eat me if I got too close to you."

Yuna giggled.

"I remember watching you dance the sending in Kilika. And I remember what happened right before I came here. I remember Auron, my mom, my home, my dad's picture on billboards ... But I can't remember any one else." This worried him now.

"Maybe … you're just tired. You've been playing ball in the sun all day. You've probably exhausted yourself."

"Maybe." He wasn't convinced, though.

Yuna coaxed him to keep walking.

When they arrived in the village, the bonfire had been extinguished. All was dark and quiet, except for murmurs and chuckles of people returning to their homes for the night. Visiting Wakka and Lulu once more, Tidus retrieved his dried clothes. Wakka told him to keep the borrowed outfit, since it was getting a little too snug for his _presence_. Mission accomplished, the pair continued their moonlight stroll back toward the airship, and Yuna began filling Tidus in on some of the events he missed in her life, instead.

Upon their return to the ship, Tidus followed Yuna up the ramp into the loading dock and through the engine room to take the lift up to the bridge. "This thing looks like it underwent a bit of an overhaul," he noted looking around, impressed.

Buddy, the only member of the crew still on the bridge, welcomed Tidus on board. "When we became sphere hunters, we had to make a few adjustments here and there. To look at her now, you'd never know the Celsius used to be frozen in ice."

"Sphere hunters, huh."

"Yep. That's what got us into this mess."

"Do you still have the sphere that you thought was me?" Tidus asked of Yuna.

"Would you like to see it?" She sat down in the pilot's chair and paused a thoughtful moment as she read the control panels. "Kimahri found this sphere on Mt. Gagazet and thought it was you, so he had Rikku bring it to me. We all thought maybe you were still alive somewhere, and that more spheres might give us more clues where to find you. Shinra's controls should have access … here we are." She pressed a button displaying an index of the spheres stored in the ship's computer log, and then she selected the appropriate sphere and played it on the large screen.

Tidus blinked in disbelief at how similar the face in the sphere was to his own. "So, he's the one who tried to steal Vegnagun?" he asked, recalling Yuna's story from the bonfire earlier.

"Yes. But he and his girlfriend were executed on the spot. She died before she could tell him how much his sacrifice meant to her - how much she loved him. So, the anger that Shuyin felt when he died consumed his spirit so much that he wanted revenge on all of Spira."

"It almost doesn't seem fair that he's real and I'm not," Tidus quietly commented.

Alarmed, Yuna turned in her seat to face him. "Don't say that. You _are_ real this time. I felt your heart beat. Besides, he's dead. You don't want to be dead do you? Being a dream is better than being dead."

"I don't see much difference. Either way, it's not like being alive."

"If you're dead, you can't come back."

"By not being born, was I ever really here? Maybe I'm losing memories because I never had them to begin with. If I'm just illusion magic, was _anything_ in the fayths' dream real?"

Yuna snapped off the sphere panel and stood. "You've been telling me to believe that you're really here. If you want me to believe it, you have to believe it, too."

"Yuna," Tidus spoke softly. "I want more than anything to believe I'm real this time. But even if I'm real right now, probably nothing else from my previous life was."

Yuna's anger turned sympathetic, then sad. Stepping closer, she took his hands in hers.

Buddy had been silent, not wanting to interrupt. "Well, I'm shutting everything down for the night. Everyone else has gone to the cabin to get some rest, and I suggest we do the same." With a stretch, he headed back to the controls for one last check.

"Yes, let's get some rest." Clearly not wanting to continue the conversation about him not being real, Yuna coaxed Tidus to follow once more.

As they entered the cabin, Tidus and Yuna found the rest of the crew preparing to settle for the night. Tidus's annoyance at his patchy memory dissipated at the sight of a chocobo pacing around the room. Finding his smile again, he reached to pet the overgrown chicken's soft, yellow feathers. "What's this doing here?"

"Oh, we found him in the Thunder Plains. He looked a bit lost."

"At least he was easier to catch than that sorry road-runner of Calli's!" Rikku added from above them in the cabin loft.

"And that?" Tidus pointed to the blue frog-like creature standing behind the bar.

"That's Barkeep and his ... Darling." A second hypello waved at them from behind the bar on the opposite side. "We don't know their real names," Yuna explained in low tones, "but that's what they call each other, so that's what we call them, too. They run the kitchen and make the best food in the world."

"How are yoo?" The blue hypello greeted Tidus with a bow. "Will yoo be shtaying with us as a noo croo member?"

"Uh, I guess so." Tidus bowed in return.

"_What_?" Brother marched down the stairs from the loft. "No one said anything about him staying with us as a crew member! This is my ship! I am the leader, and no one joins this crew without me saying so!"

Yuna winced. "Brother, he has no other place to go. And it would make me really happy if he could stay." She backed up and bowed at the waist to beg this favor. "Please."

Brother glared suspiciously at Tidus, but his gaze softened when he looked at the high summoner. "It would make Yuna happy?"

She straightened, giving the abundantly tattooed Al-Bhed her best kitten-like expression. "Very happy."

Brother groaned and smacked himself on the forehead. "Ooooh! Okay very well! But he is to do what I tell him to do while he is on board!"

Yuna looked to Tidus, hoping he would agree.

Tidus rolled his eyes and gave a resigned sigh. "Okay, I'll do what he says."

"Follow me." Brother turned and marched up the stairs.

Rikku and Paine were already lounging in their beds, watching.

Brother pointed to the beds while instructing Tidus. "Paine sleeps there. Rikku sleeps there. Yuna sleeps here. Therefore, you will sleep in the engine room."

"Engine room?" Rikku sat up on her knees. "Brother, stop being such a meanie! The sofa folds out into a -"

"Rikku." Tidus held up his hand to prevent her defense from making matters worse. "It's okay. The engine room is better than the deck. At least I won't wake up covered in seagull droppings."

Satisfied, Brother snorted and went back to the bar to get a drink.

With a growl, Rikku pitched her pillow at the back of his head. "_Cdub paehk zaymuic uv Tidus_!" she shouted at him in their native language of Al Bhed, accusing him of being jealous.

"_E ys hud zaymuic uv Tidus! Ra ec y hudrehk!_" Brother denied it and shook his fist at her. In seconds, the argument degenerated into them making faces at each other.

Having received his assignment for the night, Tidus turned away and headed for the lift.

Yuna side-stepped the siblings to catch up. "Please don't be angry. Brother means well; he's just looking out for me."

"I know. I can't really fault him for liking you. … Except that he's your _cousin_."

"I'll talk to him as soon as we can speak alone."

Stopping in front of the lift, Tidus turned to face her. The tables had turned from only an hour earlier. In the wake of realizing he had so few memories, now he was the one needing reassurance. "What if ... I wake up, and I'm not here anymore?" he quietly asked. "If I'm still just a dream, what if I fade in my sleep?"

"You were able to sleep before."

"That's after I came from Zanarkand. This time, I think I came from the Farplane. What if that makes a difference?"

Yuna saddened. "Maybe I could stay with you to keep you awake."

"Kinda hard to do if you're in the cabin, and I'm in the engine room. Besides, even if it's not safe for me to sleep, eventually, I won't be able to stay awake."

"Psst!" Rikku came near and leaned into their huddle, planting her hands on her knees. "Wanna trade bunks? I've got a plan," she mischievously whispered.

"No, no, no." Tidus backed away, waving his hands. "Rikku, my face is still bruised from your last plan."

"You bruised?" She inspected the faintly red area on his temple and cheekbone and winced. "Oh. Sor-ry. We didn't mean for the ball to hit you; we just didn't want you to catch it."

Yuna stretched her arms across Rikku's and Tidus's shoulders to huddle with them and lowered her voice, since the door to the cabin was still open. "What's the new plan?"

"We could watch over him in shifts. That way, at least of one of us will always be able to wake him up if he starts to fade."

"What about Brother?" Tidus asked again.

The Al Bhed girl waved away that worry and grinned so wide that her dimples showed. "You just leave him to us."


	4. Chapter 4: Dream Time

Chapter 4: Dream Time

The crew of the Celsius donated their spare blankets for Tidus's makeshift bed in the corner of the engine room. Shinra volunteered to keep him awake until Brother went to sleep. Boredom quickly set in, however, and Tidus ended up going outside to get one of the blitz balls from the beach. The two of them practiced volleying shots and passes to one another, and against the ship's hull, until Buddy came down and snatched the ball, fussing about the noise, after which Tidus sat on the steps to sulk, while Shinra went upstairs.

"Our goal is to get Brother to sleep," Buddy reminded Tidus with a hiss. "That's not going to happen with you throwing blitzballs against the walls and pipes!"

"There's nothing else to do down here."

"You've been playing ball since before sundown. Don't you ever run out of energy?"

Tidus sighed and looked down at his sand-covered feet. He was _very_ tired, but he was waiting. "Is Yuna coming down here for one of the watches?"

The door to the engine room slid open, and Paine walked to the rail just enough to see them below. "Come," she stated, then turned and stepped back into the lift, holding the door for them.

Tidus glanced at his blanket bedding, then Buddy, with doubt. But he ascended the stairs to the lift to stand beside Paine. "So, what's the plan? All I was told was to go to the engine room and wait."

"We had to wait for Brother to fall sleep, so he shouldn't be a problem now. Rikku and I moved her bunk next to Yuna's, so she can watch over you. The rest of us will stay awake on rotation through the night, too, so she's not the only one. Sorry about the lack of privacy, but it's the best way to make sure someone is awake at all times while you sleep." After Buddy stepped into the lift, Pain let the doors close and touched the control panel to the cabin.

When the doors opened, Tidus followed Buddy and Paine into the cabin. The lights were already out, except for a couple of small lamps to prevent anyone tripping in the dark. In silence, Rikku waited at the top of the loft. Tidus hesitated, but then climbed the stairs to meet her. Yuna was dressed in a camisole-shorts sleep set and sitting on the middle bed that was pushed up against the third bed. The futon sofa had been unfolded to make sleeping space for Rikku. Tidus's attention went back to Yuna. She was so beautiful in the soft shadows of the night. Part of him resented having to spend his first night back in the real world under the watchful eyes of so many people, but part of him was touched by the trouble they went through to make sure he wouldn't slip away. "Thank you," he whispered to Rikku with full sincerity.

Paine caught his arm and pointed at their feet as he took a step forward. Brother had set the futon chair's mattress on the floor at the top of the stairs and was sleeping on it like a dog guarding a bowl full of food he couldn't eat but refused to share.

Tidus pulled a face of annoyance at the strange young man's audacity.

Yuna giggled lightly at his non-verbal reaction, but quickly put her finger to her lips to remind him to be quiet.

"The men sleep in a chamber downstairs next to the toilets and shower," Paine whispered to Tidus. "If you have to go in the middle of the night, I suggest you remember to step over him and choose the door on the left." She pointed to Buddy, who chose the door on the right and stepped inside. "If you forget and accidentally wake our brotherly bulldog, none of us will _ever_ hear the end of it for defying him. After which, we _will_ exact revenge when you least expect it. _Nobody_ wants to be subjected to his raving lectures."

Tidus's brows rose at her mild threat, but he nodded in agreement. "Who's first watch?"

"Me," Rikku whispered. "We'll wake you before sunrise to go back downstairs. Nighty-night." She giggled silently behind her hands.

Tidus nodded again and stepped carefully across Brother's sleeping form on the floor. Then, he crossed to Rikku's bed, trying to avoid making noise as he climbed on and crawled close to Yuna.

Smiling, she wrapped her arms around his neck. "You look exhausted, " she whispered. "Try to get some sleep. Everything's going to be okay."

He gave her a small kiss, smiled at being close once more, then settled into a comfortable position on the bed next to her.

Rikku slipped a red and white twisted headband imbued with the power of preventing sleep over her brow and gave Yuna a thumbs up. Then she perched on her futon with a banana to munch.

Yuna sighed with relief and leaned back against her propped pillow. As Tidus closed his eyes and felt his tension slowly begin to ebb away, Yuna brushed her fingertips through his hair and gently touched the welt on his temple where the ball _shwocked_ him during the game.

"Stop poking at my face, you bruiser," he complained in a sleepy, barely audible tone.

She couldn't help but smile in response. "I'm not poking your face. I'm remembering, in case ..."

Knowing she didn't want to give voice to their fears, he opened his eyes.

She reconsidered her words, then smiled. "I want to remember every detail … from the silver earring in your left ear, to the barely-there freckles that dust your nose." Kissing his forehead, she laced her fingers between his. "Get some sleep. You're safe here."

Tidus closed his eyes again, but remembered the final sending - the one that destroyed Sin, yet cost him dearly. Yuna tried to hold onto him so he wouldn't slip away, but her body passed right through his. As she fell to the deck amid glowing pyreflies, he stood in sad silence and looked down at his transparent hands in disbelief. As he continued to fade, his own tears blurred his vision. So many pyreflies taking his soul away ... He couldn't stand there and disintegrate into nothing in front of his friends. So, he hugged her one last time - or tried to, anyway. He stayed until his body became too numb to feel her warmth. Then, swallowing his courage, he stepped forward through her and ran toward the edge of the airship. He ran without looking back because the desire to stay was more painful than leaping to his death. But he didn't die because he never really existed. The pyreflies maintaining his form dispersed the instant he started to fall. That was the last thing he remembered of her or his friends. Everything after that was a replay of what came before it. He thought he could hear her. He thought he could sense that she needed him. But when he called, no one answered. He was completely and utterly alone in a void between space and time.

))((

A violent spasm awakened Tidus with a start. Cold sweat beaded his brow, and his heart raced; but he opened his eyes to find Yuna practically nose-to-nose with him ... and sound asleep. With a heavy sigh of relief, he touched her cheek. Touching her was his only reassurance that _she_ wasn't just a dream.

Yuna's eyes fluttered open, and she rested her hand over the silver, chain bracelet on his left wrist.

The large window panels over the beds revealed the first light of the new day.

Paine approached from behind Yuna and met his gaze. "It's time," she whispered, removing the twist-headband she'd taken from Rikku for her watch.

Tidus touched his own cheek. "I'm still here?"

Paine returned a small smile of confirmation. "Not if you don't shake a leg down to that engine room before Brother wakes up."

Drawing his arms underneath himself, Tidus pushed up from the bed. Yuna reluctantly let go of his wrist, but smiled sleepily at him. Squinting through the low light, he rose from the bed and made his way around it toward Paine. Still groggy, he hit his toe on the corner of the bed, and his face pinched in effort to prevent a loud curse from escaping. Paine clapped a hand over his mouth and give him a scolding frown. Her head nodded toward Brother, and he raised a hand to let her know he had it under control. Then he stopped hopping and limped toward the futon blocking the stairs. Placing his hands on the banister, he swung himself over Brother's body and took one last look at Rikku sprawled on her futon. Yuna sat up to wave and watch him go. Nodding in gratitude to Paine, he padded back to the engine room, where he wrapped himself in the borrowed blankets. Tidus tried to go back to sleep, but he couldn't stop grinning at the one thought that raced through his mind. _He was still here!_

))((

The next time Tidus opened his eyes, Rikku's green, marble-swirled, Al Bhed eyes were in his face. "Ah!"

"Ah!" she echoed his reaction with a high-pitched squawk and quickly fell back. "Don't do that! That could give someone a heart attack, you know?"

Tidus was gobsmacked she was blaming him for the start. But he let it go, rubbed his eyes, and looked around to remind himself why he was in the engine room of the Celsius. "What are you doing down here?"

"You're still here." She beamed at their accomplishment.

"Yes."

"Everyone else has showered and eaten except you, and we're getting ready to land in Kilika. I came to put the blankets away, but you're still here; so, you have to get out of them first."

Tidus pushed away the blankets and stood. Glancing askew at the strawberry-blond Al Bhed, who was more frightening to wake up to than an alarm clock, he picked up yesterday's clothing and wandered up to the cabin in search of the shower. After finding it in the lower cabin and washing away last night's sand and sweat, he changed back into his familiar yellow shirt and black shorts. Then, he sat down at the bar by himself and gestured to the hypello barkeep.

"What can I doo for yoo?" The hypello approached in his usual slow manner.

"What have you got for breakfast? I'm so hungry I could eat a whole shoopuff!"

"Shoopuffsh is rububbery. Zey makes you burpsh and make funny noishes, too. Not a very good idea to eat Shoopuffsh."

Tidus's brow quirked. Apparently, hypello had no ability to think figuratively.

The cabin door opened and Yuna came in wearing a Lenne's dress sphere and a wide grin. "Oh good, you're awake! Would you like to go to Kilika now?"

"Wasn't Kilika destroyed by Sin?"

"They've rebuilt since you were here last. You'll have to stop in and see it before we go to Luca. You can eat breakfast in Kilika, if you like."

Rising from his seat, he followed Yuna to the door. "Okay, but I hope they have enough food. I'm ..." He glanced over his shoulder at the hypello, who waved and smiled stupidly. "Really hungry."

Yuna led the way to the lift. "Did you sleep okay after you went back to the engine room?"

He nodded, happy. "You look really tired, though. Did you get any sleep?"

She flushed with mild embarrassment. "Not much. I guess I was afraid to catch more than a nap."

"You can't avoid sleep just to make sure I don't fade."

"I know. But I think one night is all we needed to be sure you would be safe."

"I suppose. Guess I'm really lucky to have friends willing to deprive themselves of sleep for me, huh?"

"Well, that and the fact that Paine cast sleep spells on Brother every time he rolled over." She giggled lightly, but then put a finger to her lips to remind him that was their little secret.

))((

Later that morning, when Tidus followed the crew onto the wooden docks on Kilika Island, he turned a complete circle trying to take in the whole view. "Woah! They really did fix up this place, didn't they? This is amazing!"

Rikku pointed to the large, pink, seashell-like building that had been built to the eastern shore. "Over there's the new headquarters for the Youth League. It's so brand new that they're still moving into it. They're saying Kilika's going to expand and be as big as Luca someday."

"So, where's the food?" Tidus asked.

"Are you sure he's not another one of Rikku's relatives?" Paine asked of Yuna.

Yuna smiled and shrugged. "Well, maybe it's been two years since he ate anything."

"Hm." Rikku put her hands on her hips, closed one eye, and studied Tidus closely. "You know, he'd be _really_ skinny if that was true."

"You think?" he sardonically returned.

"But he doesn't look any different from the day he left."

Annoyed at all the inspections he was enduring, Tidus copied Rikku's stance and leaned forward to inspect her in the same manner. "Ah, but I see _you've_ gotten older."

Rikku's face drew into a pout. Punching him on the shoulder, she turned away in a huff and whipped her long, beaded braids into his face.

"Food's this way," Paine announced as her long legs set the stride down the docks toward the shops.

"So, what's this Youth League?" he asked, picking up Rikku's bit of news. Tidus turned in circles as he walked, still trying to take in all the new sights that rebuilt Kilika had to offer.

"In the beginning of the Eternal Calm, people had trouble agreeing on which direction Spira should take for the future," Yuna explained. "When Yevon fell apart, New Yevon rose out of its ashes. Their supporters feared that if we rushed blindly into the change that the Calm brought, and forgot the mistakes of civilizations past, we would suffer the same fate again. So, New Yevon took over the temples and insisted on keeping most of its traditions. The Youth League formed out of a group of people who felt that New Yevon kept way too many secrets about Spira's past, just like the old Yevon temples did. They believed radical change was the answer to avoiding a monopoly of power again. Their acts were ... brash, wanting to burn temples and such. And while New Yevon and the Youth League argued about it, a third group, the Machine Faction, was created by research engineers from the Al Bhed. Machina are back in use all over Spira now, thanks to them, even in the temples. Only they try not to call them _machina_ anymore because of bad associations. They call their new creations _machines_. They weren't really interested in politics, but they supplied the other two factions with rebuilt machina. So, even though each group was trying to avoid making the same mistakes of the past, they were setting up the same pattern of self-destruction that brought on the Machina War."

"Sounds like 'the more things change, the more they stay the same,'" Tidus commented with mild disgust.

His reaction caught Yuna by surprise. "That's almost exactly what Shuyin said. That's why he was determined to purge the world of fighting once and for all. But we were able to stop him before it came to that. Nooj, Gippal, and Baralai, the leaders of the three factions, were able to come together to stop Vegnagun. So, their groups are now trying to work together on the issues they disagree about. It's slow progress, but it's good. I think we realize now that to avoid repeating mistakes of the past, we must be able to work together in spite of our differences."

"And sphere hunters fit into all of this because everyone wants to find the spheres that unlock the secrets of Spira's past?" Tidus guessed.

"Exactly!" Rikku answered. "Well, many people hunt spheres now because they're worth a lot of gil, but Yunie and Paine had more personal reasons for wanting to find them." She winked at Yuna. "And they both found who they were looking for, right?"

"You could say that." Paine's smile was bitter-sweet.

"Oh yeah? You lost someone from a dream, too?" Tidus asked. Maybe he wasn't the only one.

Paine cast him a sidelong glance. "From a nightmare, you mean. Around the time of Operation Mi'ihen, Maester Kinoc formed a group of elite crusaders for Yevon that included any ethnic origin, including Al Bhed. He ran them through various training exercises that I was assigned to record. But as a final test, he sent them to investigate a recently unsealed cave under Mushroom Rock Road. The cave was said to be haunted. Based on what I've learned about him, I can't help but wonder if Kinoc thought whatever was in there would give him one-up on Maester Seymour. It's clear now that they were vying for power behind their thrones. Even Baralai picked up on that because he used it to persuade Seymour to cloak him and erase his record. But Kinoc played the innocent role well enough to sacrifice an entire squadron to that cave.

"While in there, my friends - Nooj, Gippal, and Baralai - were overcome by pyreflies. It looked like the place was swarming with fiends, but we know now that it was only one. Shuyin had been sealed off in that cavern for quite some time, gaining strength, until he was able to lash out at the squad members who found him. He filled them with his despair and possessed them … made them start shooting each other. They barely escaped with their lives - first because he made them want to kill each other, but then because Maester Kinoc tried to shoot them behind their backs for living to tell about it. After we escaped, we agreed to go our separate ways to avoid Yevon finding us together. But we swore to go back and find out what that thing was someday. And then Nooj shot us ..." Pain's voice trailed off, and she wore an almost vacant expression.

"Your friend shot you _after_ leaving the haunted cavern?" Tidus's eyes widened slightly at her tale.

"Shuyin hijacked his mind and body to escape. He used Nooj until he could transfer into Baralai and take control of Vegnagun. We survived the injuries, but not knowing what happened to one another, and not being able to trust one another... Not knowing what happened in that cave or why... That was the nightmare. But now we've pieced enough of the events together to make some sense of them."

"Woah, we didn't know about any of that while we were visiting the Crusaders for Operation Mi'ihen."

"Of course not. Maester Kinoc didn't want anyone to know about it. That's why he initiated my friends and ordered them to protect Maester Seymour, but then tried to kill them."

"This Shuyin guy sounds almost as bad as Sin."

"What he did was _unforgivable_," Paine flatly stated. "Had the decision been mine, I don't know that I could have shown any mercy whatsoever toward him. But I guess that's why someone like Yuna is High Summoner, instead of me."

Tidus glanced at Yuna. He had already seen her personal reason for sphere hunting, last night on Shinra's big screen. Strange how everything connected. "So, now that you've found your answers behind all that, what's next?"

"We haven't really thought about it," Yuna admitted. "It's still too soon to say, after everything that's happened. However, I think it would be good to keep hunting spheres for the sake of recovering Spira's past, don't you? The more that I hear about the Machina War, the more curious I get. It's sad that we don't know much about Spira's history, that so much knowledge has been lost over time. But there's a new mystery, too. When we went down under Bevelle to the Farplane, the entire underworld was nothing but machina construction, yet no one seems to know anything about it, not even the temple priests. The road to the Heart of the Farplane was machina, too. Isn't it strange that the souls of the dead should be found on a magical glen in the middle of steel and circuits?"

"Maybe the most important key to Spira's past lies hidden in the machina on the Farplane," Paine suggested.

"The Farplane has machina in it?" Brother asked with surprise, as he, Buddy, and Shinra caught up to them on the docks after landing the airship in the nearby bay.

"I think so," Yuna answered. "Vegnagun was only a small part of a much larger hall of circuits down there. I can't help but wonder what it all does."

"Are you suggesting we go back and take a look at the rest of the place?" Buddy asked. "We could do it, you know. We still have that teleport short-cut Shinra set up."

"I know, but ..." Yuna touched the necklace at her throat. "I'm not sure I'm ready to go back." Her eyes shifted to Tidus. "I'm not sure I want to disturb whatever is down there."

"I'm not looking forward to going back, either," Rikku agreed. "That place was really creepy. But maybe we could take Brother and Buddy with us under Bevelle just to sneak a peek at that big pumpy-pump thing under the temple. Maybe they could tell us what it does."

"I'm in." Buddy shrugged, ready for some adventure.

Brother didn't look so sure. "Machina in the Farplane? They can't be ordinary machina."

"Brother's right," Yuna agreed.

"I am?" He was pleased she had noticed.

"Mh. Whatever the purpose of all that circuitry and machina down there, it can't be the same as mere hover craft or robotic guards. It's down there for a _special_ reason. I'm not so sure messing with it is a good idea when everything finally seems to be ... right."

Tidus felt self-conscious. He knew he was the reason Yuna was afraid to dig any deeper. This was all getting very complicated. So, he decided he needed a distraction. "Fish." Turning away, he followed his nose to the vendor. "Two fish and some rice, please. Oh, and some of that yellow fruit over there." He pointed to a large palm fruit.

Yuna grinned at his appetite and joined him at the vendor to pay for his order.

With his fish dish in hand, Tidus sat on a crate. "You know what I'd like to see before we leave Kilika? The temple." He began to devour his food.

Rikku leaned forward with her hands on her knees, tilting her head as she watched him eat. "But there's a big, dangerous hole where the fayth used to be. It might not be safe for you to get so close to the Farplane."

"I want to see it all the same," he insisted.

"Well, well, well. Look who we have here." Dona stood on the docks behind them with Barthello at her side. She stepped closer to glance over Tidus as he sat eating. "Never thought we'd see you again. Where'd you run off to after the Calm, _Guardian_?"

"I ... went back to where I came from. Like everyone else," he reluctantly answered, not wanting to talk about it to them. He still remembered how they shoved him down into the cloister of trials.

"Hm." Dona gave a wane smile and circled behind Yuna. "By the way, congratulations, High Summoner. I hear you were successful at destroying that monster under Bevelle."

"Yes, it's been taken care of. And it's good to see you and Barthello back together."

"Well, I couldn't keep him sniveling outside for too much longer. It was getting on my nerves. By the way, if your blitz player is going to play guardian again, isn't it time you bought him some new clothes?"

Tidus stopped eating and looked down at his yellow and black Zanarkand blitz ball uniform. "What's wrong with my clothes?" he asked over a mouthful of rice.

"Isn't that the same thing you wore two years ago? Besides, it makes you look like a page out of history, that's what. Come, Barthello." Dona shook her head and continued down the dock.

Tidus scowled at her back as she walked away. "I really don't like her."

Behind Dona's back, Barthello stopped and turned around to face Yuna. "Thank you," he mouthed with a big grin and gave her two thumbs up.

Yuna nodded in gratitude, and he ran to catch up with Dona. "She's not so bad."

"Well, she has a weird way of greeting people, that's for sure." Tidus swallowed his mouthful of rice. "Can I help it if I was in the middle of a blitzball tournament when Sin brought me here?" He deposited his skewers, bowl, and chopsticks in the pan for dirty dishes and took Yuna's hand. "Well, anyway, I'm done. That was the best fish I've had in a long time!"

Rikku laughed at his contagious excitement. "Least you didn't inhale it and choke this time. Remember how quickly you scarfed down the food I offered you when we first met?"

"Yeah, whatever. Let's go see the temple next!"

"Okay-ay!" Yuna yelped as he pulled her along behind him.


	5. Chapter 5: Island Hopping

Chapter 5: Island Hopping

"Hey, Yunie. Maybe we should get Shinra to make Tidus a dress sphere." Rikku jogged behind her toward the Kilika temple.

Alarmed, Tidus looked over his shoulder. "A _dress_?"

"Not a dress, silly. You can wear whatever you want. Shinra just has to put it in a dress sphere on a result plate."

"I think we should put him in a dress." Brother added his opinions from behind.

Tidus slowed to a walk and looked over his shoulder again, this time with annoyance. "Who asked you?"

"I don't wait to be asked; I tell you how it is," Brother emphatically informed him.

"The magic of the garment grids can turn any kind of ordinary clothing into magical armor, and give you a few extra weapons," Paine explained.

Tidus stopped to consider Rikku's suggestion with Paine's explanation.

"A thousand-year-old blitz uniform makes you look conspicuous," Paine added.

"And putting me in a dress won't?"

"You have selective hearing, don't you? It's a _dress sphere_, not a dress."

Tidus still looked skeptical.

"I like the idea." Yuna grinned and clapped her hands together. "Let's do it! We can use the Besaid outfit that Wakka gave you and your own uniform to get you started. But we can also collect something from each place that we visit to give you a variety of levels of magic and defense. Shinra, do we have any extra spheres?"

"We have a few that are worthless for anything else. I'll see what I can do. As an athlete, he'd definitely do well with a warrior grid of some kind." The boy-genius adjusted his face mask.

"Warrior?" Tidus straightened. "Now, that sounds more like it." He grinned and proudly led the way down the docks to the forest gate.

Kilika was a beautiful tropical rain forest, much like Besaid, but with a more level land and temperate variety of flora. Monkeys and birds chattered in the tall, green canopy, but the wild animals that usually strayed onto the paths winding through the forest didn't bother them this time. Without incident, they arrived at the long, long steps to the temple.

Tidus paused in the center of the landing that had been ripped apart by a giant fiend two years earlier. It looked as good as new. At the top of the stairs, he found not just followers of Yevon, but a variety of people intermingling. "Woah, this place really has changed." Pressing on, he entered the temple's great hall and beyond, through the doors to the Cloister of Trials. "Is it okay for me to go in here now?"

"Well, not being allowed never stopped you before." Yuna was amused.

Tidus laughed, but seemed embarrassed at the reminder that he broke the temple's rules about guardians being present in the trials. Slowly, he retraced the steps he had taken to help Yuna solve the puzzle, touching each glass sphere that had unlocked the temple's secret chambers.

Yuna tilted her chin and watched with curiosity for a moment before she realized he was following the trial's order and layout. His ability to recall the steps of the very intricate lock seemed such a stark contrast to the fact that he couldn't even remember if he had siblings.

"Everything's so dark and dead in here, compared to the rest of Kilika," he spoke, breaking the heavy silence that settled within the stone walls. "It's like death and life traded places somehow."

"It's because the fayth aren't with us anymore." As soon as she said it, Yuna wished she hadn't. If the fayth really were sent, how could their dream continue? If the fayth were not responsible for his return, then who was? Great. Now she was asking the same questions Lulu had.

Tidus continued through the chamber of the fayth and cautiously approached the gaping hole where the spirit of Ifrit used to be sealed into stone under a large, protective node, awaiting the call of the summoner. Crouching near the edge, he studied the pyreflies rising out of the hole.

"You really think there's machina worth exploring down there?" Buddy asked Yuna as he knelt beside Tidus.

Brother rubbed his hands together behind Tidus's back. "Just a leeeettle, tiny push," he spoke under his breath.

Yuna reached for Tidus's arm, her eyes pleading with him to step back a few paces.

Brother sighed at his missed opportunity, growled, and turned his back to them, sulking.

"What do you think, Brother?" Buddy asked.

"Hm?" Kneeling beside his navigator, Brother tried to peer into the blackness, then scowled. "I see nothing."

Shinra studied the chasm thoughtfully.

"What of it, Pipsqueak?" Pain prompted.

"It's not a very logical place to begin. We should start with the area under Bevelle where Vegnagun was originally hidden - where I set up the com sphere. We want to examine the machina surrounding it."

Tidus glanced to Yuna. "If the Farplane's down there … maybe the answers I'm looking for about myself are down there, too."

Though it made her uncomfortable for him to be so close to the chasm, she tried easing the worry from her expression and said nothing of her fears.

Whether reading her expression or her mind, he rose and backed away. "Okay, I've seen what I came here for." Taking Yuna's hand, he let her lead him away from the mysterious, dark pit.

))((

That afternoon, Tidus came out of the bathroom dressed in new knee-length shorts of blue and green with a short-waisted vest of matching blue. He also had new slip on shoes and leather arm bracers purchased from a shop in Kilika. "I fail to see how this is going to protect me from anything. I'm dressed for a picnic."

Yuna smiled, pleased, and hopped off the bar stool to loosely tie a bandanna around his neck. "At least you look very local now."

"Yeah, the last thing I want is to be accused of looking suspicious." He gave Paine a side glance for her earlier commentary and removed the bandanna to wrap around his wrist instead.

Yuna liked that better and helped him tie it.

"Okay, hold still." Shinra pointed a gizmo with a long barrel toward Tidus.

"Woah, woah, woah! You didn't say anything about guns!" Tidus pushed the barrel away.

"I have to copy the material structure of the clothing into the sphere. It's the only way to implant the clothing into the grid's magic. It won't hurt. Just hold still."

Tidus looked to Yuna with uncertainty, but she giggled and nodded that the gizmo could be trusted. With a resigned sigh, he braced himself and closed his eyes.

Shinra zapped the clothing with a ray of light that shimmered and transferred a similar shimmer to a golden card in the top of the gun. "All done," he announced. "Just be sure that you let me index each garment you wish to add to the result plate with a sphere. It's the stored energy in the sphere that changes it into armor." He handed Tidus the golden card. "I've designed it primarily as a warrior-knight grid to enhance your strength and defense, but each sphere can have different abilities. The grid can only do so much, though. The rest is up to you."

"Enhanced strength, huh? How much do you think I could bench press with something like this?"

"How would I know? I'm just a kid." Shinra waddled to the bar and hoisted himself onto a stool, dangling his feet back and forth. "Go put your blitz uniform back on. We'll add it next."

"Maybe I could bench press Wakka." Tidus looked down at his new wonder armor and headed back to the shower. A few minutes later, he returned in his previous clothing and allowed Shinra to duplicate it in another sphere in the garment grid he'd been given.

"Two down; one more to go." Shinra handed the grid back to him.

"How do you read these so you know what it's doing?" Tidus turned the gold plate over in his hands a few times, unable to make sense of the design that held the tiny spheres in place.

Yuna smiled watching him try to figure it out on his own for a moment, then she drew her own result plate out and touched her warrior sphere.

When Tidus looked up, he was stunned to see her skirted attire change into black leather armor. "Well! That's ... _nice_."

Yuna's brows rose in amusement. It must have been hard for him to override his compulsory flirtatious nature to restrain that comment. Smiling, she reached behind her shoulder blades to draw Brotherhood out of its sheath. The shimmering blade had served her well on many occasions, but she offered it back to him. "Wakka found it after you ... left." She was careful to rest the razor-sharp blade against the wrist wearing the blitzball arm-and-shoulder guard, rather than his hand. "He gave it to me, but it always felt like it still belonged to you. I think he would want you to have Chappu's sword again, now that you're back."

Tidus knew how much that sword meant to Wakka, since it belonged to his little brother who was killed in battle. "I'll take good care of it."

"I know you will." She removed the sheath from her own back and walked around him to strap it onto his back instead. When she finished securing it, and he turned around to face her again, a lump formed in Yuna's throat at the familiar sight of him holding the weapon in his old uniform. It was as if time stood still. Tidus sheathed the large sword with ease, in spite of its large size compared to his small stature. "Oh, and ... this one's yours, too." Yuna touched another sphere in her grid. From her dark knight armor, she withdrew Caladbolg and passed it to him as well. "We've saved quite a bit of gil from sphere hunting. It should be enough to buy me a couple of new swords while we're in Luca."

Tidus's eyes widened as he accepted the second sword from her. "You actually used these?"

"I learned a lot from watching you and Auron. Of course, Paine's the one I really have to thank for my training. I had to learn to defend myself, since I no longer have aeons to summon." She slipped the result plate from his free hand and touched the previous sphere.

Tidus looked at Paine with surprise, who had been sitting quietly on a bar stool beside Shinra through this process. Then, he stepped back in wonder as the magic of the grid rewove itself around him, returning to the Kilika sphere. "This is pretty cool." He grinned in approval. "I think this one has something to do with making me faster. I feel really light. Like it's forming an invisible barrier around me from this inside, like an aura."

"I set the Kilika sphere to lighten mass for increased velocity. It's based on the first sphere configuration from Rikku's first plate so she could, ... um, ... get away with fewer injuries," Shinra explained with a somewhat guilty cough.

Tidus realized that could mean only one thing. "You turned me into a _thief_?"

Yuna returned the gold plate to Tidus and strapped the second sheath onto his back, as she had the first.

"Caladbolg contains great power," Shinra spoke from his squeaking bar stool. "You should try to find a more suitable armor to balance its energy, or your defenses could be drained for the sake of your attacks. The heavier the weave of the garment duplicated in the sphere, the more defense magic it can handle for enchantments. But this will do for now." The boy shrugged.

Tidus turned around to face Yuna and slipped the powerful sword back into its sheath. He didn't seem to know what to say.

"It looks like I have my guardian back," she stated with a bittersweet smile.

"If you can swing Caladbolg, you no longer need a guardian."

"Maybe." Yuna drew close and slipped her hands around his waist, laying her head on his chest. "But I still need you."

"Come on, you guys!" Rikku called from the lift. "We just arrived in Luca! We need to get going if we want good tickets for the game!"

"Is he bothering you, Yuna? I can make him sleep on the deck tonight!" Brother called after her.

Tidus groaned at the threat.

Paine stood and patted his shoulder. "You're on your own with that one." Walking past them, she joined Rikku in the corridor.

Yuna giggled lightly and hooked his arm to pull him along behind her. "We'll do the Besaid sphere when we get back. We don't want to miss the game."

Shinra hopped off his stool and tucked his gizmo inside of a pocket in his small coveralls. Then he ran to the lift to catch up with the others.

))((

The airship landed near the docks, and everyone disembarked. Luca was full of life, as usual. Cid offered to stay with the ship, but the rest of the Gullwings crew made their way to the central desk at the stadium, where they could see Wakka's bright orange hair in the crowd. He and Lulu were already waiting.

"Hey, hey! You made it!" Wakka greeted them. "Would you look at you - you look like a regular islander in those clam digs. Better be careful, or the Kilika Beasts will think you're a local and nab you for their team."

"I could handle it," Tidus playfully boasted.

"Oh, you could handle it," Wakka imitated him. "There you go being a brat again, ya? Your head's going to get bigger than a blitzball someday, and then you won't be able to do nothing with it."

"Nothing except knock you flat on your back."

"You willing to back that up?"

"Bring it."

"All right. When you come back to Besaid, if my team wins, you become the new captain and coach my boys next season."

"Deal. But I might need to coach your team before I play them if they're going to give me any kind of a challenge."

Wakka made a face, rolled up his game program, and smacked Tidus on the head with it.

Tidus shielded his head with his arms and dodged with a laugh.

"I don't know how you put up with him, Yuna."

"He's a stubborn, blitzball-obsessed jock. Imagine that," Lulu commented to Yuna with laughter in her eyes.

"Hey, so what are you saying with that smug tone of yours, ya?" Wakka watched his wife walk past him toward the ticket desk.

The Gullwings crew followed Lulu to the ticket desk and made their purchases together. They had the entire afternoon in the city before the blitz-off, so the first thing they did was search for replacement swords for Yuna's grid. She found a light-weight saber to take the place of Brotherhood, and a new bastard sword to take the place of Caladbolg. The next item on the agenda was finding warrior-suitable attire for Tidus's grid. He settled on some tan pants and a red, dirt-colored shirt to go under a black suit of lightweight armor made from basilisk scales. Their savings substantially lighter, they stopped in the theater to watch a short movie, and then it was game time.

))((

After the game, the party walked to the café and ordered a late dinner. Lively conversation was on the menu, as well. And when dinner was done, Rikku and Buddy introduced Tidus to the game of sphere break. He was repeatedly humbled by Paine, Lulu, and Shinra, but he enjoyed trying his hand at the game all the same. In fact, the only person he found that he could repeatedly defeat was Brother. Of course, Brother wasn't too happy about that.

Yuna was content with just enjoying the renewed energy Tidus seemed to bring to the group. He always managed to do that somehow. The most difficult and frightening risks on their pilgrimage were nothing but an extreme sport to him. She may have been the one to tell him to cover his sadness with a smile, but he was the one who always made her laugh. The thought occurred to Yuna, that this was how his story should have ended - in celebration with his friends.

Later in the evening, Tidus changed into his new dark knight armor, and Shinra helped him adjust and balance it with Caladbolg, tweaking the more powerful grid to add a few elemental energies to some of his strikes. Then, the crew spilled back into the streets of Luca and strolled to the balcony overlooking the city toward the high road for him to test it out. Tidus switched his grid and chose Brotherhood first. When he touched the weapon's blade, sparks jumped from his fingertips, electrifying it down to the tip. He gave it a few practice swings, paying attention to how the electricity flowed along the blade in order to see how it would affect his strike range.

Wakka leaned against the balcony, proud to see Tidus handling Chappu's sword once more. "I don't think I'd be touching that blade again until the charge dies down. Might make you look like you stuck your finger in a machina socket, or something." He moved his hands around his head in a fried, spiky gesture.

Tidus laughed. "Then it might serve as a good lightning rod in the Thunder Plains, if I wanted to land on my butt a half a dozen times again."

Wakka laughed in return, as did everyone else who shared that memory. "I remember that. We warned you, but you took off running without a care anyway. I'm thinking it was _more_ than a half-dozen times, ya?"

Tidus waved him off. "I'll have you know I _meant_ to land on my butt more than half a dozen times."

"Yeah, okay." Wakka chuckled. "Hey, you heading out for Guadosalam tonight, or tomorrow?"

Tidus waited for the sparks to fade before putting the long sword back into its sheath. He changed his grid to the dark knight mode to test Caladbolg, then he looked to Yuna. "Your call."

Yuna was surprised he left the decision to her. She hated that this topic continued to resurface interrupting their fun. "Tomorrow, then. No need to rush it."

Wakka sighed. "Well, I'd love to go with you, but ..."

"But the time for adventuring is over for us." Lulu passed the tiny baby into his strong hands. "Vidina needs us here. We will wait for you to come home to Besaid. We will await the answers to your truth." She gently touched a hand to one of Tidus's cheeks, giving the other a light kiss. Tidus nodded in acceptance of her unspoken concern, then she gave Yuna and Rikku hugs. This was unlike her.

Wakka shouldered the baby and gave Tidus's new armor a friendly punch on the chest. "Take care. There's no telling what's out there on those roads. You got a promise to keep, ya?" Waving, he walked away with his family.

"Wait, we can take you home!" Rikku ran down the stairs behind them.

Everyone in the group started to follow, when Yuna noticed Brother lagging behind. "You go on with the others. I'll catch up," she told Tidus.

He glanced over his shoulder and guessed what she was intending to do. Nodding in agreement, he sheathed Caladbolg and walked away without her.

Yuna returned to Brother and fell into a slow pace walking beside him. "You've been unusually quiet this evening. Didn't you have fun?"

"I will beat him next time at sphere break, I swear it!" He shook his fist in the air at Tidus's back.

Yuna winced slightly. "Don't feel that way. It is just a game, after all."

"Don't tell me how to feel! He's better at everything than me!" His shoulders slumped. "I am nothing but a loser."

"That's not true. I'm sure there's lots of things you can do better than him."

"Like what?"

Surprised at how quickly that comfort-tactic backfired, Yuna reached for any idea that could make him feel better. "Like ... working with machina. Tidus probably doesn't know a thing about machina."

Brother's face lit up. "He doesn't?"

"Nope. But there's really no need for you to prove you're better at anything than him, Brother. We like you just the way you are."

He straightened. "You do?"

"Mh." Yuna smiled, hoping that would help.

Brother shifted his position. "Yuna _likes_ Brother?"

"Of course, I do. My feelings about you haven't changed one bit since Tidus came back. It's just that … my feelings for him are ... _different_. I like you in different ways."

"But he left you! Yuna deserves better than that!"

"He couldn't help it. His connection to this world was dying."

"But I am always connected to this world. I am always here."

"Yes, I know that, but -"

"I will always be here for Yuna. Yuna makes my heart siiiiiing." Brother lifted her hand to kiss it. Then, grinning broadly at her, he headed back to the ship, whistling to himself with renewed self-confidence.

Yuna wasn't sure what he meant by that, but he seemed to be feeling better. Shrugging in acceptance of how easy that was, she followed him back to the airship. When she arrived in the cabin, Tidus was sitting on a stool at the bar, examining his grid again, trying to better acquaint himself with its imbued abilities.

"Did you talk to Brother?" he asked.

"Mh." She sat down beside him and interlaced her fingers on the counter.

"Well, what did he say?"

"He said he'd always be here for me."

"Sounds like he took it a lot better than I thought he would."

Yuna was puzzled. "Yes, he did."

"Oh, dear." The hypello shook his head. "Yoo tried to let Brother down eashily? Oh dear." He walked away, still shaking his head.

The door to the cabin slid open with a hiss. Brother marched confidently to the bar and stood before Tidus. "You and me - Mushroom Rock Road - hover bike race! Be there! Meanwhile, you can do trash patrol."

Tidus made a face. "What? Why?"

"Because you want to be a crew member, and crew members start by picking up trash."

Tidus snorted with offense. "You're doing this because I beat you in sphere break, aren't you?"

"You didn't beat me! I allowed you to win because you are a guest! If you want to be a Gullwing, get to work picking up trash!"

"There's no trash around here. The place is spot -"

Brother scrunched up a napkin from the counter and dropped it on the floor.

"-less." Tidus stared at the deliberate drop.

"And when you're done with that, you can wash down the deck!" Brother announced before leaving the cabin.

"It's friggin' dark outside! I won't be able to _see_ any dirt, much less clean it!" Tidus called after him. But arguing was pointless. He looked to Yuna in disbelief. "_What _did you say to him?"

She returned an apologetic expression for making things worse. "I thought I explained that he was just as good as you, but that I liked you differently."

"You like us _differently_? See, that's one of the reasons he likes you: you're too nice, Yuna. You always make people feel good about themselves. I mean, that's one of the reasons I like you, too. But now he's going to ride my back even harder than before." Unhappy, Tidus picked up the dropped napkin and started for the lift to clean the deck.

Yuna hurried after him. "Wait! You're right; it's my fault he misunderstood. I'll try to think of a way to fix it. Meanwhile, I'll help you clean the deck. But we'll do it tomorrow when the sun's out. Okay?"

He paused to reconsider. "Well, okay, but tell him it was your idea, so he doesn't hit me with kitchen duty, as well."

Smiling, Yuna wrapped her arms around his neck. "Thanks for being so patient with him."

"Yeah, well, whatever," he groused. "If my patience runs out, I'm going to pop him one."

Paine came out of the lift and passed on her way to the cabin. "Hey, you two. Do we need to do Operation Dream Patrol again tonight?"

"Nah, I'm... I'm good for tonight, I think," Tidus answered.

"Just say the word, Yuna. If we have to, we'll duct tape him to the pipes to keep him from disappearing."

"Of course! _Tape_." Tidus gave his own forehead a tap. "Why didn't I think of that?"

Paine gave his sarcasm a sarcastic smile, then turned around and entered the cabin.


	6. Chapter 6: Memory Lane

Chapter 6: Memory Lane

Bright and early the next morning, Tidus and Yuna took buckets up on deck while the ship was still docked at Luca and began washing it as promised. Rikku came to speak with them while they worked, but when she told Tidus he missed a spot, he slung some water from his sponge at her. She retaliated by slapping a wet rag at him. He picked up the water bucket to throw over her, but Yuna intercepted it just in time to make a backwash slosh over himself, instead. The mayhem that followed was more like scrubbing the deck with each other, rather than cleaning the airship.

Eyebrows rose as the trio returned below deck an hour later, soaked in suds, declaring that the ship was clean, but no one asked why they looked worse than their sponges and rags. Brother ran up on the deck to be sure they weren't trying to fool him and found it spotless. This frustrated him beyond words because Tidus was grinning and laughing. He wasn't supposed to be laughing. He was supposed to be miserable. He was supposed to hate cleaning the ship and want to leave.

))((

After lunch, Tidus switched his grid to the Luca travel gear but opted in favor of regular clothing for the moment. He placed the dark armor in the Besaid sphere for temporary holding. Strapping Brotherhood to his back, he had a hearty breakfast before joining Yuna, Rikku, and Paine on the Mi'ihen High Road to begin their trek toward Guadosalam. Drawing a deep breath and enjoying the sun on his face, he adjusted the visor of his new green cap to shade his eyes, and they began their walk down the dusty road. "This place has machina all over it now."

Rikku noted his surprise. "They guard the high road from fiends. There are also hovers to take you from one end to the other if you don't want to walk or ride chocobos."

"This place holds so many memories. Hey, remember that old guy that we met over there?" He pointed to a small dome as they passed it. "He was a storyteller that used to drone on and on ..."

"Maechen." Yuna smiled and rested her hand on the magus gun at her hip. "He was the one who told us about Lenne and Shuyin. He remembered them. If not for him, we wouldn't have known the whole story, and we might not have been able to speak with Shuyin and reunite them."

"That's impossible. He'd have to have been over a thousand years old to actually remember them."

"He was unsent but didn't remember his own condition until he shook my hand and sensed Lenne's presence through my dress sphere."

"Then, ... that means he was dead when I met him, too?"

She nodded. "But he wanted to pass on his knowledge before he left."

"Then the dead still walk Spira?"

"They still wander until they find peace."

"Like Auron?"

"Like Auron," she agreed. "In that sense, they're really no different from the rest of us. It's just the ones with so much pain and anger that have trouble letting go."

Tidus nodded thoughtfully. "Do they still turn into fiends if they cannot find their peace?"

"Yes."

"Then, Lulu's right. Killing the aeons was pointless, ... or impossible."

"We don't know that yet. We'll ask the guado about it. Sin hasn't returned, so we did change some things. I'm just not so sure it was the right thing to do now."

He caught the hint of regret in her voice and glanced at her with a sidelong expression.

"I wish that we had found another way. We shouldn't have had to sacrifice our friends like that." She gave him a meaningful glance.

He knew by _friends_ she meant _him_. "There was no other way. You did what you had to do."

"I'm just ... no longer so sure." She locked her fingers between his, leaning against his arm as they walked.

))((

Later that day, they stopped at Rin's Travel Agency for dinner. After placing their orders and paying their fees, they sat down at the table in the corner to rest. Tidus knocked the dust from his pants and boots, then slouched comfortably in his chair until the food was brought to them. Paine broke up an argument between him and Rikku over the cheese appetizers, then Yuna told him more stories about what he had missed over the past two years. When they finished, they rented four chocobos and headed out for the north end of the road, but Tidus turned that into an impromptu chocobo race, ... which he won.

At the end of the high road, they reluctantly returned the chocobos to the checkpoint and paused to enjoy the last colors of the sunset. "I guess it's time to go back to the ship," Yuna suggested. "We can have them set us down here tomorrow to continue on foot if you like, but we're not very well prepared to camp outdoors tonight."

It was the memories Tidus was trying to find by walking his in own footsteps again, not necessarily the challenge of surviving in the wild. So, he nodded in agreement, and they called Brother to pick them up.

That night, the airship settled on the red-rock cliffs of the high road for everyone to sleep well.

))((

The next day, Tidus, Yuna, Rikku, and Paine were deposited at the beginning of Mushroom Rock Road to continue their hike.

"Hey, whatever happened to the Crusaders that used to be stationed here?" Tidus asked.

"They were excommunicated from Yevon then pardoned, but they disbanded after Sin fell," Paine answered. "The headquarters are still there, but most have been absorbed by the Youth League. Now the Youth League has moved to Kilika."

"So, the old headquarters are probably abandoned now."

"Most likely."

Tidus paused at the entrance of the path up to the mountain's ledge. "Then, there's probably no point stopping in to say hello."

"Not really. We should have thought to take you to the Youth League headquarters to see Lucille and Elma, though. They'd love to see you again," Yuna responded.

"Something to do on the way back," he agreed with a smile. It was another item on his list of promises he intended to keep. "What about the Djose temple? Is it still there?"

"Yes, but it's as empty of the fayth as the rest. The same big hole to the Farplane exists in its chamber, but the Machine Faction has taken it over as headquarters."

"We should introduce him to Gippal and let him work off some of his energy on their research project." Paine lightly smirked.

"Research project?" His curiosity was piqued.

"It's a giant machina built with parts they're digging up in the Bikanel Desert. They kept saying it was virtually unbeatable until we beat it."

"Why would anyone make something like that after Vegnagun was such a threat?"

"Well, he will probably deny it, but I think Gippal was trying to make something strong enough to fight it. I think he also realizes now that research should be put toward better means."

"Wait! Wait!" Brother called as he ran to catch up to them. Buddy and Shinra were at his heels.

"What does he want? Don't tell me he actually wants to walk with us?" Rikku quirked a brow and folded her arms.

"Aw, man!" Tidus exclaimed. "I forgot about his challenge to race me once we came here."

Yuna turned his shoulders to face her. "Listen to me. You must let him win this one."

"Are you kidding? I always play to win."

"You've beaten him at everything we've done together so far. Let him have this one ... But don't make it look like it was easy."

Tidus snorted. "No way, man. If he's going to challenge me, he's going to have to win fair and square."

"Some things are more important than winning."

"If I let him win, do you really think that will make him feel better? Trust me, he'll have more respect for himself if he has to earn his victories. That's what my old man was trying to teach me that I didn't understand until now."

Brother reached them and put on his helmet. "Okay, Goldilocks, do you remember the race?"

"I remember." Tidus accepted the helmet Buddy offered to him. "Where's the finish line?"

Worried, Yuna shook her head. "Brother, you don't have to do this -"

"Djose temple." Brother walked to the man sitting on the hover bikes for rent.

Yuna sighed and cast her gaze to Tidus again.

"Look, I'm just going to have fun with it. He's the one that's being rock-headed about this." Tidus snapped the buckle under his chin before following Brother to the machina.

))((

"Gee, this is a tough call. Brother's always been good with machina racing, but Tidus doesn't give up on challenges easily. Who do you think's going to win?" Rikku asked of Yuna.

"It doesn't matter who wins. Brother's still going to be jealous," Paine predicted.

"What am I supposed to do?" Yuna pouted.

"Maybe we'll get lucky, and they'll tie?" Shinra suggested with a shrug.

"Let's go on toward the temple and meet them there," Buddy suggested.

"Meanwhile, we need a plan to convince Brother that Yunie's not the girl for him!" Rikku pounded her fist into her palm. "I wonder if we could uglify her, or something." She tapped a finger against her cheek while she considered possibilities.

Tidus was adjusting his position on his hoverbike when Yuna approached one final time. "Have you ever been on one of these before?"

"Well, ... there was the time we rode something like it from Lake Macalania to the temple, remember? It can't be too hard to kick it up a notch, right?"

"Be careful."

He nodded and waved that he would, then started the engine and turned the hoverbike around to get a feel for the balance as it became airborne.

Yuna and everyone else began walking toward the Djose temple, shooting down Rikku's matchmaking schemes to get Brother to meet other women. When they were about a quarter of the distance there, the racers zoomed by them at an incredibly high speed. Then, right before their eyes, Tidus's hoverbike took a spill and rolled off of the rocky road into the ocean. Everyone gasped and ran after him, but Brother didn't even notice. He kept speeding toward the temple.

"Tidus!" Yuna frantically called. There was no sign of him for a long, scary moment.

"He's a good swimmer, Yunie," Rikku reminded her, though she was worried, too. "Maybe he's just holding his breath for a really long time - like when he plays blitzball."

Finally, a sharp, clear whistle caught their attention. Tidus was in the water near some rocks to the left, waving to get their attention.

Everyone sighed with relief and ran to where he was attempting to climb out of the water. When he was high enough on the rocks, Buddy grabbed onto his hand and pulled him back over the ledge onto the road. "Are you all right?"

Tidus gasped for breath. The leg of his pants was torn and stained with blood. "I'm okay."

"Your leg is cut. Can you walk?" Paine helped him stand.

"Change your grid, so I can take a look at it." Yuna knelt beside his knee.

Tidus fished the golden plate from his pocket and switched the sphere to his dry Kilika shorts, revealing a long, bloody gash from his knee cap down the length of his shin, along with some other scrapes and bruises.

Yuna placed her hand over the cut, closed her eyes, and cast a strong cure spell to close the wound completely.

"You were going way too fast, Mister!" Rikku scolded.

"It was a race." Tidus removed his helmet and looked down at the smashed hoverbike in the water. "I guess I'll have to pay for that, huh?"

Yuna stood and frowned at him, hands on hips.

He met her angry gaze for a moment and knew all too well what she was thinking.

"Shinra and I can fish the bike out of the water," Buddy offered. "We'll take care of the repairs, too. Maybe we won't have to replace it after all." He tapped Shinra on the shoulder, and the two of them jogged back in the direction of the airship.

Yuna shook her head with mild disgust but allowed Tidus to lean on her as he limped toward the temple.

"It was fun before I wiped out." He grinned in an attempt to lighten her mood.

She was not amused.

"If the road hadn't curved under that overhang, I might have been able to overtake him." As they walked, he leaned forward slightly to see her face.

She still had nothing to say.

"I'll bet I could do better with a little practice. Do you know how to ride them? Maybe you could teach me. It gets all wobbly because it has no wheels under it and ..." He could see she was not going to respond well to any excuses. "And you told me so, and I was an idiot for not listening," he surrendered in a flat tone.

The corners of Yuna's lips curled in a reluctant smile.

"Can I get some sympathy now, or are you going to stay mad at me? I can't walk all the way to the temple like this, so someone's going to have to carry me."

Yuna mildly cuffed his abdomen with the back of her hand for not being serious about what could have been a serious accident, but at the same time, she laughed. "I can't carry you."

"Sure you can. I'm in 'light' mode. I'm light as a feather with the push of a button. Even Rikku could carry me now."

Rikku took offense. "Are you saying I'm weak?"

"No, I'm saying you're puny. There's a difference. Weak means you're just not strong, but puny means you're short, too." He patted the top of Rikku's head, then draped his arms over Yuna's shoulders from behind and tried hopping onto to her back.

Laughing, Yuna humored him by catching his legs and hefting him into a piggyback hold, though this nearly bowled her over.

He laughed with everyone else. "See? I told you you're strong enough to carry me."

"Okay, but what happens if I lean too far forward like this and ..." Yuna teasingly leaned forward.

"No! No, no, no! What are you trying to do? Flip me over your head?"

"Oh, get off her back. You look ridiculous." Rikku poked his ribs.

Tidus squirmed away from the poke, just as Yuna released him, and he caught himself by landing on his sore leg. "_Aaah-tch-tch_!" He winced and hopped, trying to avoid putting weight on it.

Paine permitted herself a rare laugh and shook her head at his drama. "Pathetic."

Balancing on one foot, Tidus grabbed Yuna's and Paine's shoulders to steady himself. Then he sighed heavily and hung his head. Giving on trying to get any sympathy from the female trio, he started limping the rest of the way over the bridge to the temple. Halfway there, Yuna gave him an amused smile as she lifted his arm around her shoulders to support him.

When they finally arrived, Brother thrust his arms in the air with a victorious shout and laughed aloud.

Rikku sprinted toward him and socked him on the arm, hard. "Well, I hope you're happy! He crashed back there, and you were so full of yourself that you didn't even notice! He could have been killed for all you cared!"

Brother lowered his arms and watched as Yuna closed the distance with Tidus and helped him sit on the ground against the railing. Crouching before him, she inspected his wound again, then walked past Brother into the temple's outpost to ask for a clean rag and some water. To Brother's dismay, Yuna was paying even more attention to Tidus now that he had lost. With a cry of anguish, Brother turned around and banged his head against the temple gates.

))((

"Serves you right," Rikku touted. "Shame on you. Maybe you'll knock some sense into yourself this time."

Brother growled and marched past his sister to Tidus. "You crashed on purpose!"

"No, I didn't."

"Yes, you did!"

"Why would I do something asinine like that?"

Paine shrugged. "Oh, I don't know; because you did something asinine by taking the dare?"

"I challenge you to a re-race!" Brother demanded.

Tidus considered this until he saw Yuna coming out of the outpost. Then, looking up at Brother, he slowly shook his head. "No."

"No?"

Yuna brushed past Brother with a frown and knelt by Tidus to clean the blood from his leg. "The wound is closed, but it will probably still bruise. The grid's armor must have protected you from being crushed, even if you weren't wearing the outer shell. The rest of your body might be sore for a few days. It should heal quickly, though … as long as you don't do anything stupid like that again."

Tidus admired her gentle touch, ... even her scolding. Looking to Brother again, he shrugged. That was all the excuse he needed to refuse a rematch.

Brother growled and grabbed his own head as if he could have pulled out every last hair out - if he hadn't already shaved almost all of it off. Turning around, he stomped away. But then he abruptly stopped and turned back around to Tidus again. "You have trash duty for the rest of the week!"

"You can't make me do trash just because I lost! Last time you made me do trash because I won!"

"I can make you do whatever I want! I'm the captain!" Brother shook his fist, hopped on his hoverbike, and zoomed away in a huff.

"That bald, tattooed, son-of-a-AAAAAHHHH!" Tidus interrupted himself with a yell to get the frustration out of his system.

All three women hushed with surprise for a minute then broke into laughter.

"I try to be nice to the guy, and he hates me anyway!" he unapologetically complained.

"He probably would have appreciated his victory more if you hadn't won so much sympathy." Paine pulled Tidus back to his feet, surprising him with her strength. "Come on, you. It's time we got going. Our goal was to make it to the Moonflow by nightfall, remember? _I'll_ carry you this time if you don't think you can handle walking. I'm taller and more sturdy than everyone else here, including you."

"Shorty," Rikku echoed with a satisfied grin and patted the top of Tidus's head.

"Who's making all that racket out here?" Gippal came outside of the temple and made his way to Paine's side. After surveying Tidus's scuffed and water-logged condition, he smirked. "Who'd you beat up this time, Dr. P?"

"Just venting a little. Sorry," Tidus grumped and tried to shake some of the water from his hair.

Gippal's good eye widened in surprise. "Hey! Woah!" Snatching his short blades, he jumped back into a defensive posture. "Isn't that the guy that was controlling Vegnagun?"

"No. That was Shuyin. This is Tidus. ... Tidus, this is Gippal," Yuna introduced them. "Gippal is the leader of the Machine Faction."

Tidus greeted him with a slight bow while hanging onto Paine's shoulder, inadvertently making her bow with him. Then, he cringed slightly at the throbbing in his leg.

"O-kaaay ... Not the same guy with the anger management complex and the really big laser gun that could blow up the world, but looks freakishly like him. And you probably brought him here to play with our really, really big machine. Am I the only one who sees something wrong with this scenario?"

Tidus frowned at being compared to Shuyin, but Yuna and the other two women seemed amused. He shifted his balance to lean against Yuna once more.

"He's here because Brother challenged him to a hover race, and he crashed," Paine explained. "Hit the rocks in the water pretty badly, but he'll be okay." She glanced over her shoulder at him. "We think." She used two fingers to give Tidus's damp temple a light push.

Gippal cautiously flipped and sheathed his blades. "Oh. Well, if he's injured, maybe I could give you a lift. Where are you headed?"

"Moonflow."

"That's not far. Let me fire up a bike." Gippal returned to the temple to leave word where he was headed.

With a wince, Tidus hung his tired head and took note of every ache in his body. "Yaaaah, not another bike ride."

Tidus enjoyed his second hoverbike ride, though. Gippal's taste for high-speed thrills matched his own. So, sitting behind Yuna, behind Gippal, Tidus gripped the back seat of the bike tenaciously and faced the blast of wind and dizzying scenery with eager relish. Gippal dropped them off at the Moonflow in no time flat and went back to pick up Paine and Rikku while Yuna found a soft patch of grass for them to sit on. After returning with the other two women, he and Tidus chatted about the hoverbikes briefly before Gippal said he needed to return to the temple. Tidus declared he was going to learn how to ride like that after his visit to Guadosalam's Farplane - another promise added to his list. His eyes shifted to the banks across the Moonflow toward the forest of Guadosalam. It wouldn't be long now before they reached their destination.

))((

"Gippal!" Paine called before he could get back on his hoverbike. "We're considering checking out the machina connected with the Farplane soon. You wouldn't happen to know anything about its purpose down there, would you?"

Gippal rubbed his chin in thought. "Nope, can't say that I do. I remember lots of circuits lining the walls where we found Vegnagun, but we had one-track minds at that time. I have no idea what all that other stuff does, now that you mention it. When are you going back?"

Yuna looked to where Tidus sat staring across the water. "As soon as we're sure it's safe," she half-explained.

"I see. Well, if you need a hand, count me in. I'll tell Baralai and the Noojster, too. Maybe we can get together and disassemble it, ... see what makes it tick."

"Okay. Thanks for the ride." Yuna waved, as Gippal hopped on his bike and rode away.

Paine chewed a fingernail as she watched him leave.

Rikku took note of her friend's expression. "Something wrong?"

"No, it's just that ... Tidus kinda reminds me of ..." Shaking her head, Pain turned away from the road to face the river. "Never mind. Just rambling to myself."

Rikku sat down in the grass beside Tidus, who had lain back in the grass and pulled his cap over his face. "So how long are we going to stay here before going back to the ship?"

Yuna looked at the glow of the pyreflies over the river and glanced over her shoulder at the little bandstand where Tobli's jazz show was playing. "Maybe until nightfall would be nice. There's no need to go any further today." Guadosalam was just across the river and down the road, but with Tidus having hurt his leg, she had no desire to push their hike to its limits today. Indeed, this might be the last day they had together forever, depending on what, if any, answers existed for him in the Farplane.

"Then I'll go get us some food." Standing, Rikku hustled to the vendor.

Yuna transferred her attention to Tidus, who had become uncharacteristically silent. Then, she looked to the forest hiding Guadosalam from the river's view and sighed.


	7. Chapter 7: The Farplane

Chapter 7: The Farplane

They ate their dinners that evening on the grassy banks of the Moonflow as they gazed out over the pyreflies in the setting sun. In spite of the upbeat jazz playing in the background, their location was a somber reminder of the reason they had come this far, and where they were headed. After eating, Tidus pulled his cap low over his eyes and lay back down in the cool grass to nap, but he felt something tickle his chin. Though he swatted it a few times, it kept returning to pester him. Finally, the sound of snickering reached his ears, raising suspicion it wasn't an insect bugging him. Rising on one elbow, he used one finger to push the brim of his cap up from his nose. Rikku had plucked a long reed and was using it to amuse Yuna and Paine at his expense. "Give me that." He snatched it from her in a mildly accusing tone. "Can't you see I'm trying to sleep?"

"That's what makes it so funny." Rikku grinned innocently.

"My father once showed me a way to turn grass into a toy shooter." Yuna picked another weed, twisting one end over the other in a loop, and pointed the feathery tip at Tidus's nose. "At least, I think this is how he did it." The shot pinged him with great accuracy, considering it was only a river reed.

"Oh, that's great! Let me try!" Excited, Rikku picked another long weed to copy Yuna's trick.

Tidus watched as all three of them copied her instructions, aimed their newly made shooters at him, giggled, and fired in unison. "Well, that should keep the fiends at bay," he muttered with sarcasm and wiped the seed pods from his chest.

"Well, what put you in a sour mood all of a sudden? It's beautiful out here. We've even got free music. Tomorrow, this long hike will be over because Guadosalam's not that far away, and then we can find out whether you're really real or not. You should be relieved, not grumpy," Rikku told him.

Paine gave her a slight frown. "That's probably why he's grumpy."

"Oh, right. I guess I keep forgetting the Farplane could suck him in so we might never see him again."

Tidus shot Rikku a discouraged look, stood, and limped a short distance away to sit on the riverbank by himself.

))((

"Rikku!" Paine and Yuna complained in unison.

"Sor-ry! I just wanted him to have fun. It might be his last night with us, and there might not be a next time for him to come back."

Yuna had to look away and blink the moisture from her eyes. Then, she quietly stood and left to join Tidus by the water's edge.

"Why'd you have to say that? Now you've upset both of them," Paine scolded.

"I don't know. It just came out that way." Rikku rubbed her shoulder.

"Well, stop trying to cheer them up. There's a lot of uncertainty for them right now." Paine shook her head and finished off the last of her drink.

"I suppose." Rikku sighed, reluctantly remained in her place, and stuffed a bread roll in her mouth to avoid sticking her foot in any further.

))((

Tidus looked up at Yuna's profile in the light of the pyreflies as she knelt beside him. His melancholy was so different now from his jokes and antics while they were on the road.

"Hey," she spoke first, not knowing what else to say.

"Hey," he answered, gazing back out over the water.

"Rikku didn't mean that the way it sounded. She's just careless about what she says sometimes."

"I know." He was silent for a long moment, as he plucked a stem of grass and rolled it between his forefinger and thumb. "I've been thinking. Now that we're almost to Guadosalam's Farplane, I'm not so sure I want to know the truth, you know?"

"I'm scared, too," she admitted.

Tidus leaned against her, and Yuna shifted until she could cradle his head in her lap. Then, she started humming.

"What song is that? It sounds familiar."

"It's the song Lenne gave to me in the Thunder Plains."

"Oh. It's … nice." Tidus closed his eyes and listened to the words as she sang for him. Hot moisture burned beneath his eyelids for an angry moment at the thought of losing all of this a second time. But considering what happened before, he knew he had to find out the true nature of his return before he could rest easy about being here again.

The walk back to the ship that night was quiet. Brother made no apologies for having baited Tidus into the race, and Tidus was in no mood to tolerate being Brother's busboy; so they kept to their separate corners the rest of the evening. Buddy and Shinra salvaged the hoverbike from the ocean, but they ended up paying damages anyway because the owner didn't think they could repair it well enough for him to use again. Since they had to pay for it, reconstructing the hoverbike for their own purposes would become their new project, ... after the trip to Guadosalam and Vegnagun's former chamber under Bevelle.

))((

The next day, Tidus woke stiff and sore due to his injuries. Yuna cast another cure spell to ease his discomfort so they could finish their journey. Then, the hikers walked from where they stopped in the Moonflow to the shoopuff ferry. The stillness of the morning, with the mist rising off of the water, seemed to echo the stillness of their conversation, as the large, elephant-like creature with the coiled nose gently trod across the river with them in the caravan seat on its back. When it reached the shore of the south bank, it obediently stopped to lower the passengers to the ground on the lift that the hypello operated. From there, they continued their hike down the forest-lined road to Guadosalam, holding a sober realization of what they might face there.

The area was well-known for its outlaw gangs, and they were attacked along the way, as usual; but the ambush proved to be unsuccessful. Tidus was amazed to discover the result plate actually did form a magical shield within the weave of his Zanarkand uniform to deflect some of the hits he had taken, for its first battle test. He was glad to have Chappu's sword back for just such an occasion, and he had no problem remembering how to use its magic to send waves of stinging salt water into his attacker's eyes before delivering his strikes. Tidus had been surprised to watch Yuna whip out her saber and fight back alongside him. She would have never done that two years ago. Between the four of them, the bandits retreated into the woods without achieving anything. In fact, one of the bandits ended up running away in his underwear, after Rikku thought to extract his clothing from him.

"Okay, Rikku, ... I know you like taking money from people that try to rob us, but why did you take the man's clothes?" Paine asked.

The little thief rolled up the items and stuffed them under Tidus's arm. "They're warmer clothes for Tidus to add to his grid, so he can continue his hike to see Kimahri after he finds out that he's really, really, _really_ here. Kimahri's going to want to see him, you know, and it's cold up there on the mountain. Besides, that guy deserved it for trying to steal from us!" She walked away, dusting her hands of the whole matter.

))((

Once they made it inside the safety of the magical guado Tree, Yuna changed from her warrior sphere to her gunner sphere and went straight to the manor reserved for the leader of the guado. To her disappointment, the leader of the Leblanc sphere hunters syndicate answered her knock instead of Tromell Guado.

"Well, if it isn't my favorite Dullwings. What brings you here, love?" Leblanc planted her hand on her hip and tried, though not too hard, to appear interested in their visit.

Yuna was in no mood for Leblanc's tart mannerisms, but she forced herself to remain polite. "We're looking for Tromell. Do you know where we can find him?"

"Oh, he's here somewhere." Leblanc waved her hand in an aimless gesture. "We were just moving out, and he was just moving in. We're moving to Kilika so we can be closer to Noojie-Woojie, now that he will be heading the Youth League there."

"Noojie ... Woojie?" Tidus crinkled his nose and tilted his head back to peer at her from beneath the raised white hood of his yellow shirt.

"Who's this?" Leblanc slapped her razor-sharp fan against Tidus's chest.

"A friend." Yuna didn't want Tidus meeting Leblanc for some reason.

"Oh?" The tall, shapely blond used her fan to push Tidus's hood up and away from his eyes, clearly relishing the possibility of having something to tease Yuna about, but her expression then scrunched in confusion.

"Please, we need to speak with Master Tromell right away," Yuna insisted.

Intrigued by their new friend, Leblanc opened the door wider and allowed the Gullwings to enter. "Fine. Go ahead and look around for him. Just stay out of my trunks, love."

"Ah, Lady Yuna." The green-haired leader of the guado people came down the stairs as they entered his estate. "I am honored by your visit. What is it that has brought you all the way out here to Guadosalam?" He took Yuna's small hand in his large palm and tapped it warmly with his long, slender fingers.

"Master Tromell, is your portal to the Farplane fixed yet?"

He released her hand. "It's only just been fixed, but I think it is stable. Who is it that you wish to seek among the spirits … if you don't mind my asking?"

"We don't seek any spirits. We wish to determine whether one who walks among us is real." She gestured to Tidus.

Leblanc quirked a brow at this juicy news, as her bodyguards Ormi and Logos came to her side.

Tromell approached Tidus. "I remember you. You were one of Lady Yuna's guardians when she was seeking the Final Aeon to defeat Sin, were you not?"

Tidus shifted somewhat nervously under the guado's gaze, as if the man had the power to see right through him already. "Yes."

"What reason do you have to believe you are unsent?"

"Not unsent," Tidus hesitantly corrected. "I was told two years ago that … I was a dream, ... created by the fayth to help defeat Sin. When Sin was defeated, I faded."

"A dream? As in … conjured from magic?" The guado's brows rose with interest. "If this is true, how is it you are among us now?"

"I don't know. A friend suggested the Farplane might hold the answers. Is there a way for me to find out without fading again?"

Leblanc caught her breath. "I recognize him now! That's Shuyin! The one who controlled Vegnagun!" she warned Tromell. Her bodyguards immediately hopped into defensive positions and drew their weapons, much like Gippal had at their first meeting.

Tidus frowned again at the association but made no move to arm himself in defense.

"This is not Shuyin," Yuna sternly corrected Leblanc. "Tidus had nothing to do with Vegnagun. He only wants to know if he's real so he can live without wondering if he'll fade again."

Leblanc stepped close to Tidus with a scrutinizing gaze. "How do you know he's not Shuyin in disguise? He possessed Baralai, you know. He even possessed my Noojie once. He's got all kinds of tricks up his fiendish little sleeves."

"Because I know _who_ he is, even if we don't know what he is," Yuna answered.

))((

Tidus lowered his gaze to the floor. Not a _who_, but a _what_ ...

"The magic of the spirit world is strong, and there is still much that we do not understand about it," Tromell spoke. "It is possible, I suppose, for an illusion to walk among us, but like the unsent, it would have to collect a large amount of magical energy to appear to be real. If _he_ does not even know whether he is real or not, he must also have a substantial sense of identity. In such a case, I would argue that his soul is real, regardless of the composition of his physical body." Tromell turned toward the door. "Come, Yuna. I will see what we can do for your guardian." The leader of the guado led the way out of his estate and walked the path up to the Farplane hidden within the magnificent tree that contained all of Guadosalam.

"This I gotta see," Leblanc muttered and marched after them.

"Right there with ya, Boss." Ormi marched behind her, followed by a skeptical Logos.

Tidus flipped the hood of his shirt down to his shoulders and followed, conscious of the sound of his shoes on the stained-glass inlays of the tree-root floor. Yuna, Rikku, and Paine followed wordlessly behind him.

"An obvious test to find out your young man's nature would be to have him step directly into the Farplane and stay there a moment. If he is really alive, nothing will happen. However, if he is an unsent spirit, the pyreflies holding the semblance of his body together will fade and disperse, revealing the spirit underneath. If he is an illusion, then he is comprised of magic, and the magic of the Farplane will probably separate the particles that create his physical form to draw them back into the flow. Abjuration would be the reverse of how conjured illusions are created."

Tidus's brows rose with worry as he gazed at the barrier between himself and the mystical landscape beyond it. He had gone through the portal once before, and nothing had happened. But he remembered now that Auron could not enter. Perhaps the fayth had something to do with keeping him safe back then, whereas now ... "If I start to fade, can someone to pull me back out?"

"For an unsent spirit? No. For an illusion? Who knows?"

"Then, I'm going with him." Yuna grabbed his hand and locked her fingers between his.

"I don't recommend it, Lady Yuna," the guado warned. "While the Farplane's magic and pyreflies will not harm the living, those who have attempted to explore it beyond our floating pedestal often return to us quite disturbed afterward about what they thought they saw. It is one thing for a person to allow the pyreflies to reassemble the likeness of a loved one for a few minutes, but it is quite another to actually step into the final resting place of the dead and contact them."

"I've crossed it before. It doesn't frighten me now."

Tidus was touched by her worry but ashamed that she would risk herself for him. "Yuna -"

She cut off what he intended to say, by simply meeting his gaze.

"Very well, it is your decision," Tromell continued. "But because of the risk, I would save that as a last resort."

"Is there another way?" Yuna asked.

"Perhaps. Would you happen to know which of the fayth are responsible for conjuring him?"

"Bahamut is the only fayth who has spoken to us about any of this."

"There's a reason only high summoners could commune with the fayth. The enforced bond to the material world, that literally sealed the fayth into stone made them much more difficult to reach, and much more dangerous when contacted. Someone summoning a fayth had to be able to withstand the trial of the fayth's powers. You being a high summoner yourself, I'm sure you are aware of that. However, if I were you, that is the safer place I would start. Call upon the fayth and ask how your guardian came back to you. If that doesn't work - if the fayth can no longer hear you in their eternal rest - then you can step into the Farplane to test his composition." Tromell faced Tidus and folded his large hands over one another. "But as you enter, hold onto something real. It might be enough to ground you in case you start to slip away."

Tidus turned to Yuna with uncertainty and lifted his brows in question. Both of her eyes, one green and one blue, seemed to reflect his fear.

"I'm ready when you are," she assured him.

"Maybe we could make a chain by holding hands." Rikku stepped forward and looked expectantly into her friends' faces, then turned to face Tromell. "Would that ground him any better?"

"You could try. It is life that keeps the troubled dead among us as fiends," the guado answered her.

Tidus hesitantly drew a breath and reached for Rikku's hand. "Okay. Let's get this over with."

Yuna gave his locked fingers a squeeze, then took Paine's hand. Paine took Rikku's other hand, forming a circle. As a group, they slowly walked through the portal onto the balcony above the Farplane and stopped at the edge.

The Farplane was as beautiful as Tidus remembered. It felt like he was standing above an expansive sea of clouds that swept toward a giant waterfall, but it was impossible to see how far down the fall dropped beneath the clouds. All of the mist from the waterfall flowed into a flower-filled glen. Pyreflies, animated particles of magic itself, swirled and floated in an array of light and color rising out of the mist, and though the colors reminded him of the pinks and oranges of the sunset, it was the moon that rose over the waters, between the distant, blue-green pillars of glowing magic.

))((

Yuna looked out over the misty glen and tried to visualize the fearsome face of her mighty aeon friend, Bahamut. Then, she tried to remember him as the small boy that his fayth really was. "Bahamut? Can you hear me?"

The pyreflies did not respond.

"Bahamut, we need to talk to you."

Only silence answered her pleas.

"Bahamut," Tidus spoke to his supposed creator. "I need to know if it's real this time." When there was still no response, Tidus impatiently stepped toward the edge and considered jumping over it. The rest of the circle followed, holding onto him tightly. "Bahamut!" He felt strange in this place - cold and thin. And when he looked down at his hands, to his horror, he saw they were fading. "No," he whispered and shook his head. "No, this can't be happening again."

Yuna clutched his hand tighter. "Don't let go!" She began tugging him back toward the barrier. "We're getting you out of here!"

"Yuna! Look out!" Paine warned, torn between continuing to hold hands and drawing her sword.

When Yuna turned to see what alarmed Paine, she was shocked. "Shuyin!"

Shuyin's ghost had appeared behind Tidus and stepped forward, partially materializing over him in their circle.

"Don't break the circle! Don't break the circle!" Rikku gripped Paine's hand to prevent her from pushing Shuyin away and drawing her sword. "We can't let him have Tidus! We have to keep Tidus here!" The small thief tightened her grip on Tidus's hand as well, though he now seemed to be possessed by the volatile spirit.

Paine's eyes narrowed on the ghost. "What are you doing here?"

"Aha! I told you Shuyin was behind this!" Leblanc opened her steel-bladed fan, but held her ground cautiously, along with her sidekicks. Her troop had followed the guado into the portal behind them. "Persistent little bugger, isn't he?"

"Yuna," Shuyin spoke through his own voice layered over Tidus's.

Yuna's eyes darkened with an expression Paine and Rikku had never seen on her before. "Give him back," she quietly warned.

"Come to Zanarkand," his multi-layered voice requested.

Yuna dared to break the circle, releasing Paine's hand to reach for her gun. But though she thrust the nose of the weapon under Shuyin's chin, she refused to let go of his hand. "_Give him back_!"

"Yunie, no!" Rikku whimpered. "You'll kill Tidus, too!"

Yuna's hand trembled, but she held her position, daring Shuyin to call her bluff. "We tried to help you instead of destroying you." She was on the verge of tears. "Please … let him go."

Folding a hand over Yuna's gun, he carefully turned it away from his borrowed body. "I can't speak freely here without endangering him. Come to Zanarkand." Then, saying no more, the spirit faded, leaving Tidus in his place.

Tidus was left somewhat faint, but Yuna wasted no time dragging him back to the barrier and out of the magical glen entirely.

))((

Outside the Farplane again, Tidus shuddered feverishly and dropped to his knees. Everyone moved at once to catch him, too late. Dizzy, he leaned forward, palms to the floor, and stared at his hands. They were solid now, but there was no denying the truth that had been revealed. "I started to fade again."

"It wasn't you." Yuna slipped her gun back into her holster to free both hands before crouching in front of him. "Shuyin claimed your body."

This utterly bewildered him because he had not realized this happened. "What? Why?"

Yuna shook her head. There was something she wasn't sharing. They had all seen and heard something he missed. He could tell by the way they looked at him.

Something warm and wet dripped onto his hand. A tear trickled down Yuna's cheek. Sitting back on his heels, Tidus cupped her face in his hands and gently used his thumb to brush away the tear before folding her into his arms.

"He wants us to go to Zanarkand," Yuna reluctantly relayed Shuyin's message.

Tidus drew a breath and exhaled with calm resolve. "Then will we go to Zanarkand."

"No." She barely found the voice to protest. "You're real. Your soul is real! We just have to keep you away from the Farplane this time."

Tromell folded his hands in the long sleeves of his jacket. " Zanarkand itself is probably not a threat to him, however that spirit... I've never seen a spirit take someone else's body like that before."

Trying not to cry, Yuna hugged Tidus. "Please don't go. I can't lose you to him now that I've finally found you again."

"The Farplane proved I'm still a dream," he gently disagreed. "We still don't know why or how I came back. Maybe the rest of my answers lie in Zanarkand. I promise I won't let Shuyin take me like that again."

"Promises have nothing to do with it." Paine folded her arms in defiance. "Shuyin's shadow was strong and dangerous. He was strong enough to possess many people at once, and when he possessed someone, he was in complete control. Without Lenne's help, we couldn't do anything to stop him."

Tidus remembered Paine's bitter tale about what happened to her and her friends.

"But Shuyin said to go to Zanarkand, so he _wouldn't_ endanger Tidus," Rikku pointed out, in spite of fretting. "If Shuyin meant to possess him or hurt him, why didn't he just do that here?"

"Why, indeed?" Tromell questioned.

With that question still hanging in the air, Leblanc folded her fan, tapped it against her chin, and cautiously approached the Farplane's barrier, peering through the portal to be sure the monster behind Vegnagun was really gone … for now, at least.


	8. Chapter 8: Journey North

Chapter 8: Journey North

Tidus sat cross-legged on the sofa, staring down at the new marble-sized sphere in his grid. Inside was the image of a long-sleeved robe from Guadosalam imbued with more magic than he would ever be able to cast on his own. But he was the very essence of magic itself - illusion, dream, a fabrication beyond reality. Yet he could touch, see, hear, ... feel and think. It was hard to comprehend the paradoxes of his existence.

"Why are you sitting here doing nothing when I told you to clean the bathrooms?" Brother called up to him from the lower deck of the cabin.

Tidus looked up from his grid, but then looked back down, making no move to get up and do his chores.

Brother growled at the lack of response and marched up the steps to confront him. "Are you defying me?"

"No, I'm ignoring you," Tidus blandly corrected.

"You can't ignore me. I make myself un-ignorable."

Tidus looked up with a pinched expression. "Is that even a word?"

Brother dramatically waved his arms. "Well, excuuuuuse me if I don't speak your language as fluently as Rikku. _Syopa oui cruimt dno du maynh Al Bhed cusa desa_."

"Whatever." Tidus tucked the grid into his pocket, placed his hands behind his head, and leaned back to watch the rain pour down the window panels overhead as the airship entered the Thunder Plains.

Brother frowned at this strange response, then bent over Tidus with knitted brows. "Goldilocks is moping? Yuna is moping. Hm, ... What did you say to Yuna?"

Tidus's eyes shifted toward him. "What do you mean?"

"She's been sad all day since you asked to go to Zanarkand Ruins. You must have done something to upset her."

"Isn't it obvious? She doesn't want me to go to Zanarkand."

"Then you should not go."

"I have to."

"Yuna doesn't want you to go, so you should not go." Brother made a dramatic slashing gesture with his hands. "Very simple."

"It's not that simple, and it's not Yuna's decision. In fact, maybe it's best that she not go with me. It will be difficult to say goodbye again if it comes to that."

"You are leaving _again_?" Brother slapped his hands to his head.

"I don't know what _you're_ so upset about. You should be glad to see me go."

Brother put his hands over his face and turned away. He struggled with himself for a moment, then sighed and turned back around to sit on the chair facing Tidus. "I would be glad to see you go, except I know it would break Yuna's heart." He put his hands over his chest. "Yuna would do anything to keep you here, and I would do anything for Yuna. So, I ask you not to leave her again."

"But that's just it," Tidus complained. "I can't do anything about _not_ leaving unless I know more about how to _stay_." Pausing, he turned around on the sofa and rose to his knees to stare out the window at the storm clouds and lightning. "They shouldn't have sent me back if I'm just going to hurt her with another goodbye."

"Yuna does not think that way. Yuna would rather have a few good memories than no memories at all." Brother stood and frowned at Tidus. "Yuna's up on deck. Go talk to her."

Tidus blinked in surprise. "Up on deck? In this weather? Is she insane?"

"That's an order! Go!" Brother stopped himself and softened his voice. "I mean, please, ... go talk to her." Brother sighed heavily and buried his face in his hands. "She loves you so very much."

Tidus stared at his rival for a long, silent moment. Then, he looked out the window at the raging storm. "This is crazy," he muttered and left for the loft's stairs.

"Tidus," Brother called again.

He stopped and looked up at him.

"I'm ... I shouldn't have challenged you to the race. I did not mean for you to get hurt."

Tidus nodded, accepting Brother's apology, and headed out of the cabin to the lift. When the lift opened to the deck, he found Yuna sitting, curled into a ball, on the stairs inside the airship's open hatch. Approaching from behind, he knelt to fold his arms over her shoulders, as he had when he faded away. This time, however, there was contact and warmth, instead of numb emptiness. "What are you doing up here?"

Yuna placed her cold hands over his warm forearms. "Listening to the sound of the rain on the roof. It's comforting somehow."

Tidus gazed past her shoulder to the dark clouds rumbling around them and the dance of the raindrops on the newly waxed surface of the Celsius. "I guess ... I haven't been acting very grateful for being given a second chance to be with you. I won't go if you don't want me to."

"People define themselves by where they come from, whether it's a place, or a time, or a personal history. You don't have any of those things. Do you?"

"I've got Zanarkand," he boasted. "But … my memories are vague. The only ones that stand out are of my old man calling me a crybaby, my mom crying because he left, and the game I was playing when Sin crashed the party. I used to believe I had a life before coming here, but now I realize it's full of holes - holes that feel as big as those holes in the temples."

"Then we must find your history and fix those holes. We are sphere hunters; we must make it our mission to find your sphere." Yuna turned to face him with a sad smile. "I'm sorry for being selfish. We'll go to Zanarkand… together."

Leaning his forehead against hers, he closed his eyes. "You don't have to smile about it if you don't want to."

Yuna blinked away her tears and kissed his forehead. "It's good to find out who we really are, no matter how painful it can be. That is eventually worth smiling about." Gathering her inner strength, Yuna coaxed him to stand with her. "We should start here, in the Thunder Plains, so you can finish retracing your steps. You have real memories outside of the dream. You deserve a chance to revisit them."

Tidus felt relieved. "Thank you."

))((

Not long afterward, the airship lowered itself over the barren Thunder Plains, and Tidus and the Gullwings disembarked for their journey on foot once more.

"I sure wish you'd picked a better place to get off at," Paine sourly commented, pulling her rain hood low over her eyes. "Couldn't you have been inspired to hoof it again in the Calm Lands?"

"Inspiration strikes when you least expect it." As lightning struck a nearby rod tower, he pulled his thick guado robe around himself and lowered his hood over his eyes. The magic of the robes would keep them warm and lightning-proof while they crossed the treacherous grounds.

"I'm sure glad I got over my fear of thunder, or I'd really be hating you right now," Rikku added. "Hey, is that a cave over there? If the lightning gets heavy, maybe we can -"

"No!" Paine and Yuna both rejected what she was going to suggest.

Tidus figured there was a story behind their reaction, but decided it would be better to ask about it later. "We've got company," he warned as three blue-and-gold skinned drakes crawled from behind the rocks. He reached to his back for his sword, but then cursed himself for forgetting to strap the weapon _outside_ of the robe.

One of the drakes lunged for him and caught his shoulder in its fiery maw, but its teeth seared into the magical barrier that protected him, sparing him considerable burns. The pain of the bite, however, was agonizing. Tidus reached to the drake's vice-like head and cast an ice spell. Ice shards pierced the large creature's skull and neck, killing it on the spot. After looking at his hand in disbelief, he turned around to see that the girls had already neatly dispatched one of the other two threats.

Rikku hopped onto the remaining creature's back and dug her daggers into its scales. "What ya got under here? Ooh! Drake scales are good alchemy reagents!"

"Just stab it, already!" Paine impatiently yelled at her.

The thief withdrew the blades and then punched them down into its shoulders again. The drake roared and whipped its neck around to pluck the pest from its wounds, but Yuna fired a shot from her magus gun that spread a sheen of magic over its scaly hide, dropping it to the ground, weakened. Paine then opened the drake's throat in one powerful slash. The drake fell, lifeless, and Rikku cut away a handful of scales, tucking them into the pouches hanging from her belt.

"We did it, woo-woo-woo-woo-woo," Rikku sang as she hopped from the carcass and did a little victory dance. "We did it, yeh-yeh-yeh-yeh-yeh. Uh-huh-uh-huh-uh-huh."

After giving the thief a tolerant sigh, Paine faced Tidus. "Come on, Goldilocks. You think I want to stay out here forever just so you can remember how glorious it once was?" Marching ahead of him, cloak swirling behind her in the stormwind, she pulled her hood low to keep the rain from her face.

Tidus would have joined Rikku in her victory dance, but he was too stunned wondering where his powerful ice spell came from. He blinked at the dead drakes, then his own hand, which glowed with a strange white luminescence.

"Shinra must have set your grid so you could do black magic with the guado robe," Yuna offered. "I've never seen so much power come from one spell like that before, though. Your magic might be stronger than you think because ... Because of what you are."

"Dream magic." It felt like a defeat to admit such a thing.

Yuna returned a sad nod.

Tidus winced at the pain in his mauled shoulder and wrapped his robe further around himself as they followed behind Paine and Rikku. Yuna stopped him long enough to cast a cure spell on the wounded shoulder, but after that, they kept pace with the warrior and the thief across the rest of the stormy territory. By nightfall, they reached the other side of the Thunder Plains and checked in with the airship to change into warm, dry clothing and get some sleep.

))((

The next morning, when they were ready to go again, Buddy deposited them at the edge of Macalania Forest.

Tidus shielded his eyes with his hand and lowered the visor of his Luca cap. "What's happening to the forest? It was always dark as night in here, but now the sun's shining through the trees."

"It's fading," Rikku sadly informed him.

"It's nearly empty of all life now, except for normal trees and a few fiends." Yuna led the way down the side path toward the groves to the spring where he first kissed her.

"What would cause an entire forest to fade?" he asked.

"Macalania's magic water and crystals came from the fayth in the temple." Paine met Tidus's gaze, leaving him to figure out the rest.

He lowered his eyes to the swirling tree roots that still laced the ground here, similar to the roots of Guadosalam. "I guess I can relate." Following the root patterns to the lake, he stood beside Yuna in silence, trying to understand all the consequences of their fight with Sin – all the changes … sacrifices.

Rikku tapped Paine on the shoulder and gestured that they should give the couple a moment alone.

"It's, uh, muggy in here. We'll be waiting at the crossroads to Bevelle," Paine offered as a weak excuse for their departure.

Rikku gave Yuna a sly wink and a grin before scuttling out of sight.

This made Yuna smile. "They think they're doing us a favor," she told Tidus, as she stepped forward to stare at the clear water that reflected the treetops, and now the sky above. "This place is special to me, though. The last time I came here, I couldn't bear the thought of it changing and disappearing. I told myself I wasn't ready for this place to become a memory yet. But now, ... I think I can let it go."

"The last time I was here, you thought you would never come back from the Final Summoning." He gave a cynical snort. "Never imagined the one not coming back would be me."

"It wasn't fair. I refused the Final Aeon because I didn't want to lose you. But I ended up losing you anyway."

"If you accepted the Final Aeon, _everyone_ would have been lost," he reminded her. "You made the right decision, Yuna. Maybe that's why they sent me back - to let you know you didn't sacrifice me. It was … my destiny to help you end the cycle, so we did what we had to do. Ending the fayth's summoning was the only way to defeat Sin and break Yevon's power over Spira."

Yuna supposed he was right. She studied his solemn expression for a moment, but then smiled slyly to herself and stepped forward. "Tidus." She placed a firm hand on his right shoulder, and then his left, turning him rather abruptly to face her. Then, she stood on her tiptoes and boldly kissed him.

After a long moment, when she pulled away, a small smirk touched Tidus's lips. "Are you mocking me?"

Yuna giggled lightly.

"You are! You're mocking me!" He laughed as he pulled away from her. "See if I ever comfort you the next time you're sad."

Yuna giggled again and reached toward him, but he batted her hands away.

"_Naaai_ \- don't touch me." He backed away and blocked her hands. "You made me fumble a pass that hit me in the head. You dropped me instead of carrying me when I cut my leg. And now you're mocking my kiss."

"Made you laugh." Grinning, she tried to get close.

"Are you kidding?" He hopped back and blocked her hands again. "I'm just a good sport to put up with all this abuse coming my way."

))((

Rikku crept close to the opening of the grove and peered through some branches. "Eh?" She straightened in confusion. "Why is Tidus keeping Yuna at arm's length and pushing her away?"

A hand clamped down on her shoulder, making her jump, and Paine dragged her back toward the crossroads to Bevelle.

"Wait - it just got interesting," Rikku whined as she was pulled away. "Oh, poop!"

))((

Tidus chuckled as Yuna caught his hands. Lowering his defenses, he drew a breath and took one last look at the large, magical trees. "Maybe whatever new forest appears here will be just as nice as the old one."

"Maybe." Smiling, Yuna slipped her arm around his, and together they turned away, leaving their old memories behind with the fading trees and crystals. Leaving the grove, they turned down the road where Paine and Rikku waited for them.

"Should we stop in Bevelle?" Paine asked as their party reunited.

"No.," Yuna answered. "We can come back to Bevelle to inspect its path to the Farplane after we've been to Zanarkand. Let's head to the Calm Lands. They've set up a carnival there now," she informed Tidus.

"Really?" He was surprised to hear that. "Well, I guess there's no better place. It's in the middle of nowhere."

"Oh, and remember Clasko? He's converted that fiend cavern into a chocobo ranch."

Tidus laughed. "Classic." It was then that he noticed Rikku staring at him with a rather odd expression. "_What_?"

"Nothing." She flashed a dimpled grin of innocence.

"I caught her spying on you," Paine tattled.

Rikku drew back in defense. "I wasn't spying. I was checking on Yunie. Those roots are slippery, and she might have fallen in, and _why wouldn't you let her kiss you_?" she demanded of Tidus. "Shame on you!"

"Shame on _me_? I didn't do anything."

"Exactly! The most romantic place in all of Spira, and you push her away," she scolded. "What a waste of an opportunity. Honestly!" The thief threw up her hands in disgust. "First Brother and now you. Do I have to do all the planning around here?" She marched ahead of everyone else, indignant.

"Well, you've done it now," Paine warned. "Rikku might make plans for your love life. Yep, I'd be afraid, if I were you - very afraid." Hefting her sword onto her shoulder, she strode ahead to catch up to Rikku.

Tidus stood stupefied wondering what just happened, but Yuna was greatly amused.

The party crossed over the Calm Lands and stopped long enough to browse the carnival events, buy some sweets at the food stand, and drop in on Clasko's chocobo ranch. They chatted with him a short time before heading down the gorge and across the bridge toward the pass through Mt. Gagazet.

Pausing for a moment to look back at the temple, Tidus wondered if it had changed on the inside, but then decided seeing it from the outside was good enough to bring back the memories he had made there.

))((

As they climbed the pass into the snowy realms of Mount Gagazet, they had to wrap their guado cloaks closer around themselves to keep out the forever-winter chill of the high region. "Kimahri!" Yuna called out to the large blue ronso as they approached the entrance of the sacred mountain. Breaking into a run, she gave him the biggest hug she could muster. "Look who came back!"

"Tidus?" Pleased to see him, the ronso's lion-like lips curled into a snarling expression with bared fangs.

Tidus knew the ronso was trying to smile, or he would have mistaken the expression to mean he was going to be dinner. "Scary," he muttered and shook his head as he received a suffocating hug.

"Sphere helped Yuna find Tidus in cage?" Kimahri asked.

"Well, not exactly," Yuna answered. "But if you had not given us the sphere, I don't know that I would have ever found him again. When Rikku brought it to me, I was feeling rather lost. The new factions all wanted me to support their agendas, but I didn't want to join any of them. I had already fulfilled the one purpose I'd trained my whole life for as a summoner, so I guess I didn't feel very useful anymore. It was that sphere that inspired me to try something different and become a sphere hunter. And that changed everything for me, Kimahri. So, thank you." She gave him another hug.

"Kimahri could sense something important about that sphere. Sphere was one of elder treasures, but Kimahri knew Yuna should have it. But, ... what did Tidus do to be put in cage?" The snarl reappeared on the ronso's face.

Tidus quirked a brow at Kimahri's attempt to tease him. "I hate to disappoint you, big guy, but I didn't do anything. That wasn't me."

"It was Shuyin - the guy who stole Vegnagun," Rikku explained. "But we wouldn't have even known about that if not for the sphere, so it's important in more ways than one."

"Hmm. Not familiar with that name." Kimahri had not realized the connection. "But sphere was destined for Yuna if it helped her find her Tidus. Kimahri heard about Yuna's battle with the big machina under Bevelle. Proud day for Yuna, like when we defeated Sin."

"Thanks, Kimahri." Considering that the large, blue, lion-like creature had raised her in her father's absence, he was like a second father to her. She was pleased when she made him proud. "Well, we can't stay long. We're on our way to Zanarkand."

"Tidus returned. Did fayth come back?"

"That's what we're trying to find out," Tidus admitted.

"Yuna and friends broke the cycle of Sin and destroyed ancient, powerful weapon, but maybe Spira is not completely free yet. Kimahri has faith in Yuna and her friends to find the answers." The Ronso folded his massive arms over his big, blue chest and twitched his tail with the pride.

))((

The fiends on the mountain trails toward Zanarkand were the worst encountered on their journey thus far. The party had to cast fire spells onto their weapons to more quickly cut through the well-insulated predators. The temperature began to take a toll on their resistance to the cold, but the cuts and bruises they endured from multiple ambushes of starving fiends were the driving factors in Rikku whining about taking a break in the hot springs. It didn't take much persuading for the others to agree. Frozen, sore, and weary with exhaustion, the quartet made their way up the treacherous rocks and through the hidden caves to the steaming pools.

"_Saaaa_, I can't move another inch. That trail is too steep." Rikku began stripping down to her underclothes before she even approached the pool.

"My back is killing me." Paine stretched and pulled her garment grid from her pocket to study it for a moment.

"It won't hurt to rest here for an hour or so." Yuna removed her guado cloak and folded it over her arm. "Zanarkand's just around the corner and down the mountain. The worst part of the journey should be over."

Tidus set the tip of Caladbolg down on the rock floor and rested his hands on its hilt as he leaned against the cavern wall and rolled his sore neck toward his shoulders. "As long as we make it to the outskirts of Zanarkand by nightfall, we should be okay."

Rikku snapped out of her tired daze. With a short, shrill screech, she snatched up her clothing and whirled to give him a firm smack on the shoulder. "What are you doing in here!"

"Warming up, same as you," he answered, shielding himself from another smack.

"You're supposed to wait outside while us girls are in here!"

"It's freezing out there!" he argued.

Paine grabbed Tidus's ear and led him to the cavern entrance.

"_Atch_! Hey! She's the one who started undressing without any warning! Why is everyone mad at me?" He pulled away as soon as they were at the cavern's mouth.

"Because you should have taken a hint and volunteered to wait outside," she scolded.

He spread his arms in dismay. "_What hint_?" He could still hear Rikku shouting something incomprehensible at him in Al Bhed.

Yuna had followed behind Paine and stepped around her to give him a hug. "You'll get a turn. We promise. But for now, could you stand watch for us while we're unarmed? Please?"

Tidus sighed with disgust.

"Thank you." Yuna kissed his cheek. "You're such a good -"

"Good sport, I know. Just go. Go enjoy your nice, relaxing, hot-water soak while I sit out here and … count snowflakes."

Yuna tapped his cold, red nose with her gloved finger. "Think warm thoughts... but no peeking." She gave him a smile that nearly squinted her eyes shut, then returned to the hot springs with Paine.

Tidus groaned to himself and found a flat wall near the cave entrance. Propping Caladbolg between his knees and crossing his arms over his chest, he pressed his back against the wall and slid down until he was sitting on the cold, hard ground. Several minutes later, as he stared at the falling snow, he heard laughter and splashes echoing from within the cavern. Scowling at his misfortune and mind-numbing boredom, Tidus hugged his robe closer and mumbled something about non-existent hints.

Eventually, he did get his turn, though. And his companions returned the favor of standing watch, so he could have the steamy pool all to himself.

Several hours later, when they reached the summit, the four of them stood in the harsh winds for a long, quiet moment, looking down upon the Lost City of Zanarkand beneath the mountain's shadow. Tidus gazed with apprehension at the familiar, yet unfamiliar, city that fell a thousand years ago. In his own memories, his dream memories, it was full of life right up until the moment Sin whisked him away two years ago. When he was ready, Tidus took the first step down the sloping road to the crumbled ruins. Everyone else somberly followed.


	9. Chapter 9: Memory of Light Waves

Chapter 9: Memory of Light Waves

As Tidus followed the broken highways and crumbled arches of Zanarkand, he felt like he was walking in a fog of memories. He knew these places … could still see the people. Yuna, noticing the rather distant look in his eyes, reached for his hand. Fingers clasped securely within hers, he continued toward the doors of the temple, where a tall man with brown hair and bright blue robes waited for them.

"Isaaru." Yuna greeted him with a bow. "Thank you for answering our com sphere call from the ship."

"As the guardian of the temple at Zanarkand, I cannot deny a request of this nature to you, Lady Yuna." He glanced to Tidus. "I hope you find what you're looking for in there. And I hope that whatever is looking for trouble, doesn't find you." He pulled open on the heavy, iron door, gave them a formal Yevon bow, then stepped aside for them to pass.

Wearing his dark knight armor, Tidus drew Caladbolg from the sheath behind his shoulders and flanked left with caution. Paine copied his sphere choice and moved to the right, sandwiching black-mage Rikku and white-mage Yuna between them as they scanned every corner of the ancient temple for anything that looked like it was trying to take the shape of a fiend. If Shuyin wanted to fight again, they were prepared.

Monkeys that had taken up residence in the ruins scattered out of their way as they passed through the great hall into the corridor leading to the stairs. Faces appeared and disappeared in the swirling pyreflies that swarmed freely throughout the haunted domain as if it were the Farplane, yet nothing provoked them. The Cloister of Trials was still unlocked from the last time that Yuna and her guardians passed through, so all they had to do was step on the lift and descend into the Chamber of the Fayth. Walking to the tiny alcove at the back, they crossed the cracked node in the center of the floor. This was where Yuna had faced her greatest challenge - the unsent spirit of Lady Yunalesca, keeper of the spell that summoned the Final Aeon.

"I just realized something," Yuna spoke, breaking the heavy silence that settled on everyone's nerves. "This temple has no hole into the Farplane like the others."

"Why would this temple be spared?" Paine questioned.

"I'm not sure unless it has something to do with the fact that we never agreed to summon the Final Aeon." The stone still lay beneath their feet, where the outline, but not the body, of Lord Zaon's fayth remained. "Maybe Lady Yunalesca is the one who restarted the dream."

Rikku crouched over the long, large crack in the tomb's transparent shield. "But she wasn't a fayth. She was just an unsent summoner. And she would have gladly sealed him into the body of the Final Aeon two years ago, so why would she bring him back now?" Rikku stood and drew in a breath of dread. "Maybe she brought him back so she could turn him into an aeon anyway to get revenge for us turning her down so he could become the next Sin like his father Jecht and then we'd all be dead like we were supposed to die in the first place summoning the Final Aeon two years ago the way that Auron did when he and Jecht and Braska were here!"

"How did you just say that in one breath?" Tidus shifted his stance. "Even I'd have to come up for air in that sentence."

"Something's happening over there." Paine pointed to the corner where a cluster of pyreflies rose and changed colors like a neon nebula, growing whiter and brighter around the empty ledge through the open entrance to the Chamber of the Fayth. A fiend was forming.

Tidus readied his sword in one hand and reached for Yuna's hand with the other. "Whatever happens, don't let go of me."

"You should be safe here," she tentatively reminded him. In spite of the abundant pyreflies and frequent hauntings, this place did not exist on the plane of magic, as the Farplane did.

"I wouldn't call any meeting with Shuyin _safe_." One glance from Paine was all it took to remind everyone of this spirit's ability to possess others. Shuyin was the real danger here, and he had already claimed Tidus once. Shuyin was the reason Yuna dreaded coming back to Zanarkand.

"It's him," Rikku nervously confirmed as the fiend continued coalescing amid the pyreflies, taking on the familiar shape of a young man with golden hair and deep-blue eyes.

Tidus scowled and tightened his grip on his weapon. This was the monster that nearly destroyed Spira. This was the monster that nearly destroyed Paine's friends. This was the monster that could have killed Yuna. This was the monster that nearly claimed him. Yet this monster looked so much like himself. Why?

"You came." Shuyin smiled warmly as he came forward with an easy stride contradicting Paine's statement about him being a threat. In unison, everyone else snapped into defensive positions with raised weapons, warning him to keep his distance. Shuyin seemed to have expected as much but didn't look worried. "I didn't come to fight. I came because I owe a debt to Lady Yuna." His eyes met hers. "You were seeking answers to questions about _him_." He cast a glance toward Tidus. "Perhaps, I can help."

"How can you help?" Yuna voiced her skepticism. "You're not one of the fayth."

He sighed as if he had a million different things to say, but his time and presence in the material world were very limited now. For a moment, he had trouble finding words. Then he quietly told himself, "Begin at the beginning." Drawing a breath, he turned his back to the weapons and began a slow, steady pace. "A thousand years ago when I lived in this city, I was a blitzball player, like my old man before me. We didn't get along because I was never good enough for his expectations. He was a famously talented, cold-hearted drunk. Then, one day, he disappeared without a trace. It broke my mom's heart and filled me with resentment." He stopped pacing and looked toward them. "Sound familiar?"

Yuna and Rikku, knowing what they did about Tidus's family, were stunned speechless.

Tidus's brows knit in anger. Was Shuyin mocking him? "That's not funny."

"No, it wasn't." Shuyin matched Tidus's expression almost exactly. "But I tried not to let it drag me down too much, you know?" His anger lightened. "I had a great girlfriend, and I had a new career to think about." Shuyin lifted his gaze to the chamber's mysterious star-scape overhead. "At that time, Zanarkand was one of the most prosperous cities in all of Spira, but even with our state-of-the-art technologies, we preferred magic over machina. Because of its mystery, however, magic was highly frowned upon by Bevelle, which was more closely allied to the Founders."

"Founders?" Paine questioned.

"The Founders came from a distant land. They supplied Spira with export items and people. We supplied them with raw goods, obeyed their laws, and made them rich. That's how imperial colonies work, right?"

Yuna blinked with surprise. "Spira was a colony of a larger civilization? But there are no other land masses on this planet. Does that mean ... we were the colony of another world?"

"Another world that had a strong mistrust for magic." Shuyin folded his hands behind his back. "Bevelle and the Founders began to feel threatened by Zanarkand's magic. The Founders eventually became so paranoid about what might happen if we became hostile, that they ordered Bevelle to increase their machina weapons … a show of strength to keep Zanarkand in line. So when Zanarkand declared that it no longer wanted to be part of the Founders' colony, they gave the order for Bevelle to destroy us. Their attack on Zanarkand came as a complete surprise and killed many people. After that, Zanarkand's leaders were no longer willing to submit to Bevelle's authority. War was inevitable." He paused. "Are you with me so far?"

"That's when the battle in the Calm Lands occurred." Yuna guessed, based on what sketchy bit of history the temple of Yevon _did_ offer. "It's hard to believe that summoning was once so mistrusted in Bevelle, though, considering how important it became to the Maesters of Yevon after Sin came."

Shuyin nodded. "High Summoner Yu Yevon ordered all of our warriors and summoners to the front lines of battle."

"Including you and Lenne."

He nodded again. "When I woke after the battle in the Calm Lands, I was told Lenne was captured and being held in Bevelle. And it looked like the army of Bevelle was heading to Zanarkand to finish it off. So, I had to help her escape, and I wanted to try to stop them. While I was looking for her, I found Vegnagun. I thought if I could use it to free her, or if I could use it to destroy Bevelle's army before it reached Zanarkand again ..." His voice trailed off, leaving that unfinished train of thought to its own demise. "Anyway, it didn't work. I was caught, and they held me in confinement."

Rikku recognized the event. "Kimhari's sphere!"

"A friend helped me escape, and I found Lenne's holding cell and freed her. But those halls all looked alike. We got lost trying to find a way out, and Vegnagun ... Well, there it was again. So, I decided to try one more time while I had the chance. I told Lenne to watch for guards at the door because I didn't want her to get hurt if something went wrong. She worried I wouldn't know how to operate it, but I told her I could handle it." He smiled briefly, but then closed his eyes to recall the horror of what happened next. Memories of a thousand years past washed over his expression.

"I checked Lenne's position one last time before entering the robo-shell and climbing the ladder past the gun's inner workings to the control center at the head. Because this machina was intelligent, because I had a music background, and because I had been able to spend a few minutes with it before getting caught, I figured out how to open the gun's laser barrel this time. I began charging the gun's energy, and Vegnagun willingly aided me in automating as many controls as it could."

Saddened for them, Yuna folded her white mage wand to her chest. "I saw what happened in my dreams. She tried to stop you, but ..."

"Footsteps ... The same thundering footsteps that had already chased us through those endless halls were coming again. Lenne heard them, too. I left Vegnagun to go to her, but they cut off our escape. And that's how I ended up destroying the only person worth saving." Shuyin opened his eyes and swallowed his grief. "I hated myself. But then I hated Bevelle, Yevon, and Zanarkand, too. None of them deserved to exist because their fighting only led to senseless death."

"It wasn't your call to make," Paine coldly replied. "And that doesn't excuse what you did. Are you aware of how many people died, or nearly died, because of _you_?"

"I know the face of every victim in the Farplane. My rage blinded me for a thousand years. But I see more clearly now. And I realize that I owe a great debt," Shuyin answered in quiet apology, accepting her resentment and criticism since he could relate. "But there is no punishment I can endure or miracle I can perform, that will give back the lives that I took. So I offer help in the only way that I can now."

"I don't understand what any of this has to do with me." Tidus felt angry, confused, and he still refused to lower his sword before the dangerous apparition just yet.

"I was getting to that." Shuyin moved a few steps closer to him. "To defend the city at all costs, our _illustrious_ leader sacrificed the rest of Zanarkand's people and used their souls to power his own defensive magic. They became the fayth, and he became protected by his new aeon-armor - Sin. It was good for him, I guess, because he became virtually indestructible. But it turned Zanarkand into a city of the dead. He got his revenge on Bevelle, then summoned the fayth to create the dream - an eternal Zanarkand in the Farplane, built on real memories of real people." Shuyin pointed at Tidus. "That's where you come in."

Staring into the eyes of the apparition, Tidus began to feel as if he was staring at his own reflection through some kind of watery, blurry surface. After considering their identical backgrounds again, a wave of nausea washed over him. "Don't tell me I'm you."

Shuyin returned a wry smirk. "No. You are not me. Lenne's little brother lived near me and used to hang out at all my games. He was really smart, and even at his age, it was obvious his magic was strong enough to earn the title of summoner someday. He was a pest sometimes, but he was a good kid." He shrugged at the fond memory. "A few years ago, his spirit found me and asked me if I would do things differently if I had a second chance at life. I said no because not even a second shot at life would change my mind about trying to save Lenne. But then I thought, 'If I had just been able to find the exit corridor... If I had just hidden in the shadows with her instead of trying to use Vegnagun ... If I had done just _one_ thing differently ... maybe she could have lived.'" Shuyin shook his head. "I was already lost to any second chances. But somehow, from the part of my soul that wished for something better, Bahamut was able to find you."

Yuna's eyes widened. "Bahamut ..."

"The fayth placed you in the dream in my place, see?" Shuyin moved forward again, chest touching the tip of Caladbolg as if testing Tidus's ability or will to kill him.

Tidus could have dispersed the spirit instantly with one thrust of the powerful sword, but he held his hand as steady as he could manage under its weight. He felt very bewildered... almost betrayed. "So, I'm what … some _reincarnation_ of you? A _clone_? _Mirror image_? _Polar image_?"

"You are an altered memory of me that transcended time. You are the person I might have been, had I made different decisions. In some ways, we are the same person, but in other ways, we are very different individuals, you and I. But, no, you are not me, so I prefer to think of us as … brothers."

Rikku sniffled and lowered her mage wand. "That's so beautiful. So poetic."

Anger and confusion melting into a plea, Tidus lowered his sword. "What about now? Am I still just a dream?"

"I don't know the answer to that question." Shuyin folded his arms at his chest. "The only thing I can do is tell you about your origins."

"How can I exist if we sent the fayth and ended their dream?"

"I can't answer that, either. I don't know how their magic works. But you didn't destroy the fayth; you destroyed the enchantment Yu Yevon used to bind them to his summoning. I was able to recreate some of that bond myself when they tried to stop me from destroying Spira. And I could command them even better than he did," Shuyin boasted.

"You must have a strong spirit, to be able to taint my aeons with hate and madness like that," Yuna noted with a twinge of regret that she had been forced to fight former friends.

"Maybe that's why they chose me as the prototype for him." Shuyin gestured to Tidus.

"I'm not that strong," Tidus mumbled under his breath.

"You defeated Sin without the Final Aeon. You killed all of the aeons the fayth had to offer, except the one that would perpetuate the cycle of sacrifice to Yu Yevon. And then, you defeated him to keep him from feeding on any more souls."

"I couldn't have done any of that without the help of my friends," Tidus corrected him.

"Then that means your friends are part of your strength." Shuyin's form faded slightly before returning to full view. "I can't stay much longer. The Farplane's call to rest is strong because of my distance from it all those years that I was unsent. But I can offer my memories of how we lived before we died, … if you want them," he told Tidus.

All eyes turned to Tidus. Yuna chewed a bottom lip, but kept her thoughts to herself, respecting that this decision was his and his alone to make.

Tidus was quiet for a moment, trying to think through the possible consequences of knowing more about his former life as a real person. "If I had your memories, would I be more like you and less like me?"

"Maybe. Maybe not. But since you already have a strong sense of who you are, you might be better off without them."

"Then I guess … I'll pass."

"A wise decision." Shuyin backed away.

"Shuyin," Yuna spoke. "…Thank you."

He bowed, acknowledging her gratitude, then turned to leave.

"Shuyin," Tidus called.

The ghost turned back around, flickering between stages of transparency as his pyreflies began to separate and float away.

"By any chance, ... were you a _good_ blitzer?" Tidus asked feeling a small pang of regret that he couldn't identify more with the mysterious spirit.

A slow grin spread across Shuyin's face. "Star shooter for the Zanarkand Abes," he proudly announced. Then, he broke into a sudden, full run toward Tidus.

"Woah, I didn't mean for you to -" Tidus prepared to block a tackle, but Shuyin's body passed right through him, bursting into an array of pyreflies.

Tidus felt cold and distant as if he was floating in water. A blitzball came speeding toward him so fast he barely caught it before it slammed into his face. He was in an arena in the middle of a championship tournament, and he was being tackled. He struggled to break free of his attacker's hold and turned to punch back with such force that his opponent broke right through the cyber-net that held the water of the pool in its spherical shape. Water sprayed into the crowd as his opponent landed on their laps. Shuyin grinned to himself with satisfaction, even if he did fumble the ball. Back in play, the ball shot into the air above the water dome. Shuyin swam toward the surface so fast that he broke it like a leaping dolphin. He soared high, arching backward in one fluid movement to kick the ball, but before he could complete the impossible shot, his upside-down view of the night sky revealed the surprise arrival of warships. Towers erupted in one explosion after another, and a huge tidal wave crashed down on the city in a macabre attempt to put out the flames with a flood. Zanarkand began to crumble and wash away right before his eyes, but as he was falling, his only thought was of Lenne. War with Bevelle was inevitable now.

When Tidus came back to his senses, he found himself on the floor of the temple surrounded by Yuna, Rikku, and Paine. "Yuna, … we found my sphere," he whispered and touched her hand. "It's Shuyin."

))((

Later that evening, on the rocky outskirts of Zanarkand, the party stopped in the same place they stood two years ago before the last leg of the journey to get the final aeon to defeat Sin. Tidus had not said much after his encounter with Shuyin, but when Paine offered to call the ship to pick them up, he declined, saying he wanted this night to be no different from the others - staying on the road until nightfall. Yuna set up a campfire with Rikku and Paine, but Tidus moved a short distance away to gaze at the orange-streaked sky behind the black-silhouetted ruins. He didn't get the answers he was hoping for, and yet he was given so much more he didn't expect.

As he stood overlooking the flooded and crushed remains of the lost city, his recalled seeing the tragic events all over again - first from Shuyin's memories of warships, then from his own memories of Sin. He had witnessed the same complete and utter destruction of hundreds of thousands of souls that night. He had once lived a real life ... as Shuyin. But he wasn't actually created until after Shuyin died. He was a memory from the light part of Shuyin's soul. But none of that answered the question about what brought him back and whether he could stay.

Yuna's footsteps drew near as she left the campfire and climbed the rocks of the ruins to stand behind him. "It's the fayth," he spoke, breaking his silence. "My thoughts were scattered in pieces, but they collected them to make my form again." He stretched his arms over his head, trying to sound upbeat about it for her. "Probably. Something like that."

Yuna's eyes turned from him to the sunset as she considered the possibility.

Tidus looked down at his hands. "But, ... maybe I'm still only dreamed."

Yuna became worried. "Then, you'll disappear again someday?"

Tromell and Shuyin had both commented on his strong sense of identity. Maybe it had nothing to do with the dream. Maybe his thoughts and feelings were enough for the fayth to make him real this time. Sighing in frustration, he turned around to make a defiant announcement. "If I'm with you, and you're with me, and we take care of each other, then I'll be okay." He gave her a confident smile and turned back to face the sunset.

Yuna, surprised to see that playful expression again, wrapped her arms around his waist from behind and leaned her cheek against his back. "Did the fayth really say that?"

He put his hands over hers. "Just now thought it up," he quipped with a smirk.

His flippant response made her laugh. As he laughed with her, however, she gave his back a shove.

"_A-a-uwah_!" Tidus plunged into the water not too far below them. After a moment to brace himself against the ice-cold sensation - very different from the warm oceans of Besaid - he stood and wiped at the water that went up his nose. "I said it's important to take care of me!"

"Didn't disappear, did you?" she returned with a coy smile.

Tidus looked at his hands once more. He had been able to sleep through the night, fight fiends, heal after an injury, and eat until he was stuffed. If he had not disappeared through any of that, maybe it didn't matter whether he was real or not, as long as whatever brought him back didn't mean trouble for everyone else. Maybe he had been going about this all wrong. Instead of trying to find out more about his own status, maybe he should be trying to find out the status of the dream. "_Unh_!" He held his hands up to her as proof that she was right, ... and as a ploy for her to help him out of the water.

Yuna giggled as he gave up on her help and sloshed through the waist-high water back onto the embankment. Then, she hopped down from the rocks to join him.

Tidus approached the campfire, dripping wet and shivering.

Rikku snickered behind her hand. "Hey, you're wet."

"You think?" he answered.

Paine raised an eyebrow and waited for what she knew he was going to say next.

"Okay, _now_ I'm ready to go back to the ship," he announced with a chill.

"If that's all it took to change his mind, we should have pushed him into the water hours ago," Paine commented to Yuna and stood to put out the fire.


	10. Chapter 10: The Dream

Chapter 10: The Dream

"Okay, people, remember to stick to the plan," Brother instructed as he stepped onto the lift in the temple of Bevelle. "We all go down to the pumpy-pump thing and see if we can find out what it is."

"Right!" Rikku seconded him.

"Then we go down into the lower dungeons to see where it connects with the Farplane hole."

"Right!"

"Once we get there, _you_ stay put since we don't know what kind of funky things it might do to you." He poked a finger into Tidus's chest for emphasis.

Tidus rolled his eyes but nodded in agreement. After what happened in the Farplane portal, testing his susceptibility again wasn't worth the risk.

"I can't hear you." Brother put a hand to his ear.

"All right, okay?"

Yuna wagged a finger at Tidus to remind him to stick to it.

"Then," Brother continued, "we see if we can find what's-his-face in the Abyss to ask about the dream. And if he can't explain anything, we start taking things apart!"

"Right!" Rikku pounded a fist into her hand. "We'll get to the bottom of this one way or another."

"Don't you mean the _core_ of it?" Shinra shifted the heavy tool bag on his shoulder.

"I'm ready when you are." Buddy patted his own large bag of tools.

It took two trips to get everyone from the Gullwings crew down the lift to the lower level.

"Looks like the inside of an ancient computer chip," Buddy commented, seeing the underground up close for the first time.

"There's more," Shinra promised, having come down here once before to set up the com sphere and temporary teleporter to the Abyss. The boy jogged away, unafraid of the machina Yuna and company had previously taken down in the forbidden zone.

Everyone else followed up and around the circuit-like trail of blinking lights to get to the secondary lift that would take them to another hidden area. There, they passed the "pumpy-pump thing" that had first drawn their attention to the fact that everything underground seemed to be mechanized.

"Is this it?" Buddy asked.

"Part of it," Yuna answered. "There's no telling how extensive it is."

"It's a pump of some kind," Brother announced.

"Well, I could have told you that." Rikku placed her hands on her hips.

"No, I'm serious. It's an actual pump - like a valve that regulates the flow of the engine fuel."

Yuna was puzzled. "You mean … like a heart?"

"A humongously sized heart." Buddy set down his bag and removed a pair of binoculars to study the ceiling cables running to and from the device. "Are you recording this?" he asked of Shinra.

"Of course." The boy had already hooked his equipment to a memory sphere, but then passed it to Paine. He picked up another instrument and waddled to one of the walls to search for a circuit panel. When he found one, he pried off the rusty cover to study the pathways and wiring underneath. Within a few minutes, the boy genius had tapped into some of the clear strands that pulsed with electrical current and was consulting the output on his instrument. "The pressure is irregular. It's incredibly old. Whatever it is, maintenance is in order, or it might not last much longer."

"What do you think it does?" Yuna asked.

"Can't tell yet." Buddy squinted up into the rafters. "We need more information."

"Can I take a look?" Tidus held out his hand for the binoculars.

"Knock yourself out." Buddy placed them in his hand. "I'm moving into the next chamber. The cables seem to be coming from there." Picking up his bags, he followed the ledge into the next area.

Shinra disconnected his equipment as soon as he finished his analysis, then hurried after him. The rest of the party followed, but Tidus lagged behind, gazing through the scopes at the circuited ceiling and its multitude of cables. They did all connect from the next chamber, as Buddy suggested. "What kind of power source -?"

"Excuse you." Rikku side-stepped after Tidus bumped into her.

"Eh, sorry about that," he half-heartedly apologized but continued scanning the ceiling.

"See anything interesting?" she asked.

Thick coils of power lines in the enormous dome's shell hung limp and useless, appearing to have been cut. Other lines continued to pulse with light. The mechanism that turned and pumped in the center of the previous chamber could still be heard pounding, clinking, and hissing as it methodically sustained whatever it was supposed to be maintaining. "It's so big!" Tidus exclaimed with awe.

"There's more," Shinra promised again as he set up his system to record and run tests.

Paine, assuming her old job as recorder, moved to a place where the memory sphere could see everything the boy was doing. She zoomed in on the recording he was getting, then she zoomed back out to take in the structure of the entire chamber. Then, she lowered the sphere to get a wide group shot, ... just because. "My new friends are just as valuable as my old ones," she told Rikku, who smiled at the sentiment.

Tidus, remembering some of the fun he had the last time he held a pair of binoculars, lowered his gaze to the back of Rikku's head, … then her back, … then her butt. "Hmm …" He turned the binoculars to Yuna's backside and smiled until the binoculars were jerked out of his hands.

Paine quirked a brow at having caught and recorded him in the act. "It's been a long two years for you, hasn't it?"

"Heh." Tidus scratched the back of his head and tried to not look guilty.

Yuna turned to face them, thinking they were talking to her.

"He's a boy trapped in a man's body, Yuna." Paine passed the binoculars back to Buddy.

Rikku and Yuna blinked at Paine, then Tidus, wondering what she meant by that. Tidus shrugged as if he had no clue.

Shinra finished his observations and repacked his equipment. "The power source is definitely coming from below - the core of the Farplane. If my earlier readings were correct, there's enough energy down there to last several lifetimes. It must be what powered Vegnagun. And if we could find a way to harness it, we could -"

"_Really_ soup-up the engine in the Celsius!" Excited, Brother and started making engine rumbling noises, while revving imaginary handlebars.

Paine lowered the memory sphere to give him the same deadpan expression she had given Tidus for his use of the binoculars.

Shinra ran to the edge of the balcony and looked over the short wall to the towers far below. Everyone joined him to view the deck below from the balcony's dizzying height. The towers guarded the giant combination lock that once sealed off the dungeons of Bevelle, but no path or lift lead down to it.

"We have to go down there?" Brother tried not to sound nervous.

"It's already been unlocked," Shinra answered.

"Well, what are we waiting for then?" Tidus hopped over the edge onto a long, thick chain - the only connection - and surfed down the links as if they were a mere water slide.

With a gasp, Brother slapped his hands to his head. Grinning, Shinra hopped onto the chain behind Tidus. Everyone else followed suit. The only one left, Brother forced himself to take the leap but yelled his dislike of the ride every bumpy inch of the way. When he reached the bottom, he knelt and kissed the wide, stable concrete beneath his feet. Yuna led them to the place on the lock's outer ring where she could hop down onto the first ledge below it, then the second, and finally the third. Then, she ran into the tunnel and turned to wait for the rest of her crew.

"Be careful in these tunnels." Paine put away the memory sphere and drew her warrior sword. "They were full of fiends the last time we came through, and the more time we spent contemplating which way to go, the more fiends we attracted. So, move as quickly as you can and stick together to avoid getting lost." She hopped down the tiered ledges of the lock behind Yuna.

Everyone else followed suit. When they were together once more, they raced down the first hall of dungeon tunnels, looking for an opening to the next level until they were forced to stop at an intersection where each passage looked exactly the same.

"Now what?" Tidus asked.

"Rikku has the best sense of direction when it comes to these kinds of things." Yuna looked to the small thief for guidance.

"Was it this way?" Rikku pointed in the direction she thought she remembered taking the first time the Gullwings came through here.

"There were supply chests that way." Yuna turned a circle in place and tried hard to remember which path led where. "We need to go directly to the center."

"That would be easy if a direct path to the center _exists_," Paine retorted. "The last time we were here, we wasted a lot of time fighting fiends because we kept running in circles."

"Oh, why does this place have to be so complicated!" Rikku stamped her foot in frustration. "That way!" She changed her mind and pointed down a different corridor.

With no better lead to follow, everyone ran down the corridor Rikku picked. Instead of finding the center, however, they found a cluster of liches and imps in another intersection.

"Rikku!" Paine loudly complained and readied her sword.

"Stop yelling! Yelling only confuses me, okay?" She steadied her double daggers. "Uhhh, … that way!" She pointed to the opening on the far right.

"Are you sure?" Paine had her doubts.

"No." Rikku whimpered as the fiends encircled them. "Oh, why didn't we remember to bring our Charm Bangle to make them ignore us?"

"Any place is better than here." Tidus faced Buddy and Shinra. "Go ahead and make a break for it with the equipment. Paine, Rikku, Brother - open a path for them. Yuna and I can handle what's left, so you're not hit from behind." He glanced at her to be sure he wasn't speaking out of turn, but she answered with a firm nod and switched to her white mage sphere. Drawing upon her magic, she summoned a protective shield over her friends.

"I am the leader! I give the orders around here!" Brother protested.

Tidus scowled, daring him to argue for the sake of arguing at a time like this.

"And I was just going to say that is a good plan."

Tidus was stunned to finally have Brother on his side.

"Let's do this!" Bellowing a war cry, Paine charged the smallest imp. Her powerful sword sliced it in half, reducing it to a glowing swirl of pyreflies. Another tried to block her, but she cut it down with the same force and speed.

"This way!" Rikku cut in front of Shinra, stabbed twice at the imp in their path, then grabbed the boy's hand and pulled him through the fight into the opposite corridor.

Buddy raced after them, while Paine finished off the imp that Rikku stabbed. Turning, she also took a slice out of a lich that was reaching long, skeletal arms toward them. As she ran after Buddy, Brother raised a large gun point-blank to the monster and fired. The lich dispersed in a whirl of pyreflies, and the remaining fiends gave up on the escaping party to turn their attention to the two left behind.

Yuna summoned a bladed staff and cast another protective shell around herself and Tidus. "Take out as many as you can. I'll restore you."

Tidus looked at the sword in his hand. Caladbolg, "the one which consumes all," was more than capable of taking a lich down quickly, but there was more than one lich. If he didn't take them down quickly enough, they could slip past him to Yuna. Currently equipped with only protection and cure spells, she was as vulnerable now as she was two years ago with no fighting skills. Tidus sheathed his most powerful sword and switched his grid from his dark knight armor down to his guardian sphere for more agility. Even though he was outnumbered four to one by creatures that could kill with a mere touch, he grinned at her. "This is just like old times. All we need now is an aeon to summon."

Yuna returned an anxious laugh. "And a few more guardians wouldn't hurt."

But they had no more aeons or other guardians. This time Tidus would have to manage alone. Raising Brotherhood in his right hand, he lit the blade with a shock spell from his left, creating a more deadly bite than the sword itself could normally give. Then he lunged toward the remaining fiends with as much speed as he could muster. He slashed left, then right, primarily targeting the ones that tried to circle behind him toward Yuna. The cold, bony hands of death clawed and grabbed at him from all sides, but as cuts penetrated and withered his skin, he felt the wounds knit back together again. Keeping a safe distance between herself and the battle, Yuna sustained him with a constant litany of healing spells. Tidus twisted and turned with barely any room to maneuver between the fiends. Sparks and arcs of lightning followed his lead, spraying in different directions until one-by-one his opponents' pyreflies were dispensed, and the last lich fell before him. The fight left him breathless, and pale-blue gashes marred his chest and arms, but he survived and kept Yuna from harm.

"You did it!" Astonished, she hastened to his side with a small bottle of blue liquid, she applied it to the worst wounds to conserve what was left of her magic.

"_We_ did it," he corrected, exhausted. "I would have bit the dust ten seconds into that without you."

"Are you okay?"

"I am now." He smiled for her though many untreated wounds remained.

Yuna slipped the healing potion into her pocket and planted a quick kiss of admiration and gratitude on his cheek, then pulled him to his feet. "We have to hurry. We can't lose the others!" Together, they ran down the hall until she came to an abrupt stop and grabbed Tidus's arm.

"Why are we -?"

"Ssh! Listen ..."

Footsteps could be heard echoing through the maze in the distance ahead.

_ Footsteps, ... The same thundering footsteps ..._ Tidus remembered Shuyin's words.

"They went that way," Yuna decided and pulled him forward again. By following the echoes of their friends' footsteps, they were able to stay oriented enough to catch up to the rest of the crew on the edge of the platform that encircled the Farplane. "Well, here it is," she breathlessly announced, pleased with their successful strategy. But then she faced Tidus with a measure of concern.

He knew why. His expression changed from that of a determined warrior to a defeated child. "And ... I'm staying right here," he reluctantly assured her, backing away from the ledge. This was it - his last chance to find out his truth. If this failed, he had no other place to seek answers. "If he's down there, find out as much as you can about whether the fayth still dream. That's more important than anything about me specifically."

"Are you sure? I know you're as curious as I am about what happened before."

He gave it some thought. "Maybe if there's time, ... I'd kind of like to know how old I am. That would be a quick and easy answer, right?"

Yuna smiled at his simple, selfless request. "We won't be long."

He nodded and gave her a hug. "Be careful."

Pulling away, she walked to the edge of the platform. "Ready, Gullwings?"

"Ready!" everyone else answered in unison.

Standing on the edge of the chasm, Yuna took one last look over her shoulder at Tidus, then leaped.

Tidus waited until every member of the Celsius crew had jumped into the chasm before he ran to the edge and looked into the depths. They had disappeared without a trace. After a long moment of trying to see through the mist, he became aware of the cold sweat on his brow, and it wasn't from running through the maze-like halls and fighting fiends in the Bevelle dungeon. All alone above the Farplane, Tidus made himself back away and sit in the center of the platform, as far from the edge as possible. Dropping Brotherhood to the floor beside him, he folded his arms over his knees and rested his forehead on them. All he could do now was wait.

))((

In the vortex of the chasms beneath each of the temples, the winding roads all led to one place - the Abyss of the Farplane - the magical glen where the spirits of the dead came to rest. Yuna knew this because she had been here before. The misty, flowered meadow under frothing waterfalls formed a mysterious, magical buffer against time and space that no one on Spira fully understood. Buddy, Brother, and Shinra looked around, not knowing which to be in awe at more - the Farplane itself, or the technology that contained it. Yuna stood and looked around for something more.

"The heart of the Farplane is beyond that portal," Rikku told Shinra, pointing to a swirling, red cloud that strongly resembled the iris of a very large eye. "There's more circuitry in there, along with what's left of Vegnagun."

"How could a place like this exist in the middle of all that machina?" Buddy asked, referring to the mechanical dome from which they had come.

"Bahamut?" Yuna stepped forward, looking around with hope. "Bahamut, if you can hear me, please answer. It's very important."

A short distance from her, pyreflies coalesced to take on a transparent form. Within seconds, the form developed into a small, purple-hooded boy seated in the lotus position. But a few more seconds passed before the mysterious fayth spoke. "He did not come?" No name was necessary. They both knew the subject of this discussion.

"He chose to remain above. We were afraid the Farplane might pull him away."

"But he has questions."

"He wants to know if the fayth still dream."

"The fayth stopped dreaming when Yu Yevon was destroyed. Thanks to you, we can rest now."

"Then, ... how did he come back?"

"He is a neo-genesis - the first of his kind."

As everyone in their group gathered around, Yuna crouched to speak to the boy at his eye-level. "I don't understand."

"There is no easy way to explain."

"Please try," she respectfully begged. "Shuyin told him he was some kind of memory you created from him after the war, but he didn't have time to explain much beyond that."

The boy fell silent, mulling over this news before speaking again. "He accepted this?"

"Yes."

"Did either express interest in restoration?"

"No. But he so badly wants to know what this means for his future and the return of the fayth. We all do."

"Perhaps he is ready." Bahamut lifted his chin, but the shadows under his low hood still concealed his eyes. "Try to help him understand this is the way it had to be."

Yuna nodded and braced herself for ... she didn't know what.


	11. Chapter 11: Reason to Be

Chapter 11: Reason to Be

"The aeons were not enough to help the survivors of the Machina War truly defeat Sin," Bahamut began. "This was Lady Yunalesca's plan from the beginning, that the Final Aeon would defeat Sin, only to take its place as the next one. The dead could only look on in despair, unable to affect change in the physical world because of their rest. And the spirits who could not rest were too lost in their own pain. The fayth could not fight Yu Yevon because his necromancy trapped our souls in his summoning spell. But the fayth decided to see if one of the illusions from the dream was strong enough to do it. If the illusion could reflect part of Yevon's own magic back at him and cast off the possession of the Final Aeon, maybe he could defeat Yu Yevon himself. At the very least, a real life would not be wasted if the illusion did not survive. At least, ... that was the plan." The small boy's spirit floated in silence for a moment, no trace of emotion on his half-hidden face.

"Our first choice was Jecht. As a famous athlete, he was physically capable of becoming a strong warrior, but more than that, he had determination and courage. We needed someone who wouldn't give up until he won. So, we sent him to Lord Braska as a guardian for his pilgrimage. Jecht befriended Braska and another guardian, Auron. And when the time came for Braska to chose which of his guardians he would sacrifice to become his Final Aeon, Jecht volunteered because he didn't think he could ever return home. We thought everything was going according to plan. He did defeat Sin, but then he, too, fell victim to Yu Yevon's possession. As the new Sin, he returned to punish the rest of Spira once again for attacking Zanarkand, feeding Yevon's desire for revenge and power with more sacrifices, just like all the other Sins before him. There was, however, one difference. Jecht retained his awareness of who he was and what he was doing. He hated Yu Yevon for using him, and he hated himself for being helpless to stop the cycle of destruction. So, he was willing to help us try again. But we needed something more - something Yu Yevon wouldn't expect." The small fayth paused again.

"Auron's spirit made a promise to Jecht to search for his son. But Jecht's son had died almost a thousand years prior. Jecht never knew because he died when the boy was a child. I assume you know the story of how Shuyin died since you are the one who was finally able to send his spirit, Lady Yuna."

Yuna blinked with surprise but nodded in agreement. _Shuyin_ was Jecht's son. That truth was difficult to accept, having believed all this time that Sir Jecht was Tidus's father. "I didn't send Shuyin. He left voluntarily, ... with Lenne."

Bahamut became silent again as he hovered before her. His hooded face continued to show no trace of emotion, but Yuna could sense his sadness.

She considered what she had learned from talking to Shuyin's spirit. "He was your friend, wasn't he."

The boy nodded.

"And yet, ... he used you to attack the temples."

The boy nodded again.

"You must feel very betrayed." She quietly sympathized. "I think he regrets having done that now."

"He does." The young fayth lifted his chin ever so slightly. "I'm still glad that my sister chose to be with him. He was fun, sincere, and loyal. He had his father's courage and determination, even if his jokes were corny and he got a little cocky sometimes. When Lenne died, Shuyin's soul changed. He became lost to us because he refused to let go of his despair. But we found the part of his soul that desperately wanted a second chance, and we fashioned an illusion around it. The neo-genesis was unique. He was an illusion created from memories, but he shared a real soul. He came from the past into the present, ... like the way we see a star's light only after it has traveled many years to reach us."

"Neo-genesis ..." Yuna tried to understand so she could explain it to Tidus when she returned.

"Auron's spirit watched over him as if he was Jecht's real son until the time was right that he and Jecht could pull him from the dream into reality. As we sent Jecht to your father, we sent the neo-genesis to you. The neo-genesis was to be your guardian for a short time – just long enough to help you defeat Sin and banish Yu Yevon from Spira forever." Bahamut's tone saddened again. "Because of our earlier failure, he had to kill his own father. But he is the only one who could have done this. It was the only way to free Jecht, the fayth, and all of Spira from Yu Yevon's control."

Yuna remembered the tears that freely flowed down Tidus's cheeks as he held his defeated father in his arms, after finishing his tragic deed. His friends had helped him win the battle, but afterward, they all felt his grief more than their victory. Even now, thinking about it made her blink back tears. She had cried a lot that day, having to fight her faithful aeons before sending them and her faithful guardians, away - first Auron, then _him_. Yuna buried her face in her hands, but she tried to keep listening beyond the burning emotion returning with the memories.

"When the fayth were sent, he faded with us because he was an illusion from our dream. But like Shuyin, his soul couldn't rest. He wanted to continue being your guardian." The boy shrugged in exasperation. "We didn't know _what_ to do with him."

With a light laugh, Yuna wiped away a tear.

"We thought maybe we could use him to help Shuyin find his peace, but this other half of his soul had developed a consciousness of its own. When Shuyin finally did return, he wanted to give the neo-genesis a second chance with you, ... in return for what you gave to him."

"Lenne," Yuna guessed.

"More than Lenne - forgiveness." The child-spirit paused. "We weren't sure it would work. Spirit magic is powerless in the material world without some kind of bond to it. But since you seemed to miss each other so much, we summoned him one more time. His own desire to live is what sustains him now."

Yuna sniffled and clasped her fingers at her chin. "Can he stay? ... Please?"

"We can't promise he'll never fade; but if he uses common sense and stays out of trouble, he should be able to live in your world for a very long time. He's as real as he can be, considering his origins. Just make sure he understands why we had to do this – why it had to be this way."

"I think he accepted his fate soon after you told him the truth about the dream. He knew what would happen, but he did it anyway … for us."

"Lady Yuna, you have done so much for the lost and living souls of Spira. The least we could do was return the soul of your guardian to you. Besides, he was beginning to drive us crazy."

Again, Yuna laughed lightly and brushed at the tears on her lashes. "Then, his return doesn't mean trouble for Spira?"

"Trouble for you maybe, but not for Spira." The fayth allowed himself a hint of a smile.

With a smile that she was unable to contain, Yuna straightened and turned to face her friends. Everyone grinned, sharing her happiness at the good news. Rikku, who had also been moved to tears at the memories, stepped forward to hug her. "He can stay with us, Yunie. He can really stay!"

But looking at her friends and their equipment, reminded Yuna of the other reason they came here, and she wondered if the fayth could help with that, too. "Oh! Bahamut, would you happen to know why all this machina is down here?"

"It's the Heart of the ship."

Everyone blinked in bewilderment.

"Ship?" Brother asked. "What ship?"

"Spira. She's a ship."

Buddy was as stunned as everyone else. "Like an airship?"

"_Space_ ship." Bahamut's body began to thin slightly, but he lingered to explain. "A long time ago, a faraway world was looking for planets to colonize as their population expanded and their resources dwindled. They couldn't find any worlds suitable for their needs, so they built one. Spira was the first ship to successfully support life as an artificial world, partly because Zanarkand intermingled with non-human races and learned how to summon a magical dimension into its core. Alien technology and magic gave the ship itself life, in a sense. The Founders weren't happy about that. They didn't know much about it but thought it was dangerous. Eventually, they ordered Zanarkand to cease and desist because they feared the magical experiments had gone too far. What they really feared was being outpowered and overthrown. So, the Founders ordered Bevelle to attack Zanarkand. Yu Yevon convinced Spira to flee the Founders to prevent an even greater retaliation. Spira's freedom was perhaps the only good thing to come from the Machina War, but we've been fighting to be free of Yu Yevon ever since."

Buddy gazed at the overhead circuitry with new awareness and awe. "What kind of fuel could keep a ship running for a thousand years?"

"The Farplane," Shinra answered. "Remember the tests we did before allowing the Gullwings to come down here to find Vegnagun? All that energy to power many cities ..."

"The Farplane breathes life into Spira." Bahamut thinned a little more. "As long as life exists on Spira, the Farplane will absorb the energy cast off by spirits and use it to sustain the ship. You could say Spira is the real dream since she is the one who ultimately holds our collective memories."

"Well, dream energy might endlessly recycle, but the part of the ship that is machina is falling apart," Buddy stated. "If you ask me, corrosion is our biggest enemy now."

"She hasn't had any maintenance checks in over a thousand years." Bahamut shrugged and shook his head. "What did you expect?"

"Why doesn't anyone else know about this?" Paine asked.

"Yu Yevon hoarded and destroyed spheres containing that knowledge. Destroying knowledge made it easier for the Temple of Yevon to take control of Spira following the Machina War. Banning machina for everyone but themselves ensured people would continue to fear Sin. With no knowledge of their own history or technology, future generations would perpetuate the cycle of sacrifice based on fear and ignorance. Yu Yevon and his dream would be immortal."

"That's why surviving spheres are precious," Yuna realized.

"I don't suppose you could tell us where his sphere hoard is?" Brother could almost taste sweet fortune with such a discovery.

The fayth defiantly folded his arms. "Fat chance."

"Oh, come on! We deserve some kind of reward for fixing such a big machina. It's a whole planet we're talking about!"

"If you keep finding spheres that survived the war and piecing together their individual stories, you'll soon have a whole library of knowledge. That kind of reward truly is priceless."

Paine tilted her chin to one side in curiosity. "What kind of world did Spira come from?"

Bahamut's body began to swirl with pyreflies. "Earth."

"Wait!" Yuna begged of the cloud of light that was disappearing. "I forgot to ask one more thing. Please. …He would like to know how old he is now."

"The neo-genesis was created about three years ago, just in time for the reappearance of Sin," the voice answered though his light dimmed.

Rikku giggled. "He's three?"

"Well, that would explain a lot." Pain gave Yuna and Rikku a glance of wry amusement.

"But, technically, his soul is a thousand-year work in progress. So, we'll split the difference and say he's the same age as when he had to leave you - seventeen." The boy's presence trailed away and was gone.

Yuna smiled. "Thank you, my friend. ... Rest in peace," she whispered to the departed fayth.

))((

A few days later on the island of Besaid, the door from the lift opened and Yuna walked down the stairs into the engine room of the Celsius, with a cheery smile and two tall drinks decorated with tropical flowers.

Brother and Tidus were working on the hoverbike that crashed when Brother put his hands to his head and shook it in disgust. "No, no, no! You can't put that part there! It goes here! You will never be able to help us repair Spira's Heart if you can't tell the difference between a gyroscepter circuit and a spring-fusion conductor!"

"Well, you didn't tell me what a ... spring-gyro-fusion-thingy is!" Tidus cast his wrench aside before standing and leaving the engine room though the open hatch to the beach.

Yuna paused with concern at Tidus's frustrated exit, but then continued toward Brother and handed him one of the cups she carried. "Rikku and I have been experimenting with fruit. Would you like to try one of the drinks we made?"

"Oh, thank you! Yuna is an angel to think of such things on a hot and humid day like this." He gratefully accepted and guzzled down the drink to quench his thirst.

"It's just something to thank my brotherly bulldog for protecting me so well." She planted a quick kiss on his cheek.

Brother's tattooed face flushed a slight pink, and he waved her away in embarrassment. "It was nothing, really. At least, he will take good care of you, now that he knows he will have to answer to _me_ if he doesn't."

Yuna was amused at her cousin's assessment of his previous conflict with Tidus. "How's the repair going?"

Brother snorted in annoyance. "You were right. He's got the mechanical talent of a monkey! He will never be able to help us fix Spira's inner core. He is useless to us except for picking up trash and cleaning the bathrooms."

Yuna tried not to laugh. "Oh, I don't know. He's pretty good with a sword and magic. We'll need that for hunting spheres."

"Are you saying he's better than me at hunting spheres?"

"No, no. You are ... differently gifted." She smiled.

"Oh." He had never thought of it that way before, but he liked the way it sounded.

"As for the inner core, maybe it would be better to ask for help from the Machine Faction. It's a big job to repair a big ship. Cid contacted Gippal, and he's on his way to help Shinra with his analysis of the core's design."

Brother set down his cup and looked up at her, aghast. "What'd he do that for? We can handle it ourselves!"

"Well, ... leading the Gullwings is a big job, too. It's very important that we continue to find as many spheres as we can. We need the help of our captain to do that."

Brother folded his arms at his chest and nodded in approval. "Well, when you put it that way ..."

Yuna smiled and picked up the spent cup. Then, she walked down the ramp in search of Tidus. He was right where she suspected he would be - in the water taking out his frustrations on a blitz ball by seeing how many sustained air-volleys he could keep going. After setting the empty cup in the corner of the ramp, she removed the sleeves of her thief sphere attire and folded them on the ground to keep them dry. In her bikini top and skort, she stepped into the cool, shallow tide and waded in up to her knees. Putting her fingers to her lips, she whistled to get his attention and held up the other drink with a light shake.

Tidus swam toward her until he could tuck the ball under his arm and walk the rest of the way to her side. "Thanks. What is it?" Accepting the cup, he examined it skeptically, then took a cautious sip.

She laughed at how different his response was to Brother's. "It's a fruit drink. It won't poison you; I promise."

"I saw Rikku making drinks behind the bar when I took a break from the engine room. I've seen her mix alchemy potions, too. Anything she experiments with has the potential to be poisonous." He liked the concoction, though, and ended up drinking down the rest of the icy treat rather quickly. "Ah -!" He winced. "Brain freeze."

"I take it your bike repair lessons didn't go so well?"

"Not exactly," he grumbled.

"Well, Cid's talking to Gippal right now about the Machine Faction helping with the repairs on Spira's Heart. So, while Rikku and _I _were making drinks, I contacted Kimahri and updated him on what we found out. Then I contacted Tromell, Nooj, and Baralai to update them, as well. They think it would be a good idea to build a library near the ruins of Zanarkand for storing any future spheres we find, like Bahamut suggested. I'm not sure how I feel about that, but even Isaaru and Kimahri thought it was a fitting way to honor the memory of what happened there. I told them I wanted to check with you first."

"Me?"

"You're the only real Zanarkand resident left who can voice an opinion about it."

Tidus laughed lightly at the irony of the word. "It's okay with me." He shrugged. "It's not like the blitz stadium works anymore, anyway." With a sly grin, he finished the last of the drink.

Though amused, she bumped the ball out of his grip. "What a shameless thing to say. That's a sacred place for everyone else on Spira."

"Oh, so I'm the only real resident of the place, but I'm completely out of touch with reality because I only _think_ I used to live there?" He drew back in mock offense. "Get your act together, crazy woman. Either I'm really here, or you're a little touched in the head for _thinking _you see me." He set the empty cup in the sand and waded a few strides in to reclaim the ball floating on the surface.

"Who's crazy? I already explained that you're really here." Maybe he needed a little reminder. Feeling mischievous, Yuna sneaked behind him to give him a surprise push.

Hearing her feet in the water, he anticipated her action and dodged. What he didn't anticipate was the broken shell his foot landed on. Tidus hopped back with a wince just as a wave rolled forward and tipped his balance, wiping him out with a splash. Sitting in water up to his waist, he squinted up at her as she giggled.

"See? You're really here."

Ignoring the ball, he sprang out of the water and hefted her over his shoulder as he had at their beach-night game. "That's twice you've done that to me now, on top of all the other abuses! I think you need to see how it feels." But instead of taking her back to the dry sand, he faced the ocean.

"Wait! I didn't push you that time!" Still laughing, Yuna cried out and gripped the back of his shirt while hooking an arm around his neck to avoid being dropped in the water.

"Hey! _Goldilocks_!" Wakka called from the beach as he strode toward them. "When you're done being a kind and loving gentleman to your girlfriend there, how about giving me a hand with a few things here in the village!"

Tidus stopped swinging Yuna over the water and set her gently on her feet. "What is it with everyone calling me that? Have you never seen blond hair before?"

Yuna swept a strand of thin, brown hair behind her ear that the breeze had blown into her eyes. "Have you never heard the story of _Goldilocks and the Three Bears_?" The realization hit that he probably had not. "If you can't remember Shuyin's past, you probably can't remember his childhood either."

"She's a little _girl_ in a children's story, ya?" Wakka chuckled. "And since you're surrounded by three women who have to protect you from fiends …"

"Very funny." Tidus squinted one eye shut into the sun and patiently wiped the salt water from his arms before wringing out the hem of his Besaid shirt. "You know a smart man would enjoy being surrounded by three women on a long road trip. ... Well, except when they kick him out of the hot spring into freezing wind and snow."

"Heh. A smart man would know not to say something like that in front of the _one_ woman who could send him packing."

Tidus looked at Yuna, who lifted her chin and folded her arms, tapping her fingers on one elbow. "He's right, you know. You're pretty vicious now. Am I even safe with you any more?" He rubbed his chin as if rethinking this decision.

She waved off his mock doubt.

"So, Goldilocks, you going to make yourself useful and help me back at the village? Or you gonna bum around all day on the beach?" Wakka asked again.

"Well, I'm definitely _not_ going to help if you keep calling me that."

"Who's gonna stop me?"

Squinting into the sun again, Tidus defiantly crossed his arms and stood his ground. "Seven to nothing, old man."

Wakka got in his face. "Who are you calling old man, little girl?" Turning away, he strode toward the dunes but then stopped and looked back. "I'll sweep the beach with you tonight!" Continuing up the beach toward the road, he paused and called back, "I'll put you on diaper patrol, that's what - now that's scary work, right there!"

Tidus and Yuna grinned as they watched Wakka leave the beach for the road back to the village. "He doesn't realize yet that I've got all the time in the world now to whip him back into shape," he told her.

Yuna laughed. "Don't hurt him too badly, okay?" After picking up the empty cup, she turned to walk back to the airship but stopped with a small yelp when her long braid pulled taut behind her. He was holding onto it again.

Closing the short distance between them, he toyed lightly with the fluff of hair at the end of the braid. "Will you tell me the story of Goldilocks when I come back?" he asked with a hint of embarrassment.

Yuna was touched by the child-like innocence of the request. "Of course." A spark of excitement ignited within. "I know lots of stories I could share. In fact, I should make spheres of all the stories I can think of and donate them to the new library at Zanarkand, so they won't be forgotten. Stories are part of our collective knowledge, too. They represent who we are and who we hope to be, ... kind of like our dreams."

Tidus seemed to like that explanation. "Tonight, then. On the beach with a bonfire. Okay?"

"I'll be waiting ... right here," she promised, as _he_ had promised when he remained behind on the edge of the Farplane.

"It feels good to be alive again - at least, as alive as a dream or a neo-genesis can be." Releasing her braid, he cupped her face in his hands and gave her a kiss.

Time stood still for Yuna until he withdrew.

With a sheepish smirk, Tidus cleared his throat. "I'd … better see what Wakka wants in the village. I should be nice to him before I cream him tonight so I can coach his _sad_ little team." Wading back into the water, he picked up the blitzball. Then he jogged away from her, across the white-sand beach toward the road to the village, but paused to wave before continuing on that path.

Shielding her eyes from the sun, Yuna waved back and watched until he disappeared behind the foliage at the bend in the road. Looking down at her toes in the cool, wet sand, she felt the tide pull away some of the grains beneath her feet. Losing sight of him felt a little like that. But then she smiled and grasped one arm behind her back, comforted that this time he would return to her again and again. "Now it's _our_ story."

))((

Author's Note:

Thanks to those of you who left reviews during the original story's posting, and to those who wrote or left messages during my absence from this account. Your support and encouragement reminded me why I enjoyed writing in the first place - to imagine, to explore, to have fun, to entertain. If you are new to my Final Fantasy fan-fiction series, thanks for taking the time to check it out. And if you enjoyed this one, "Spira's Sphere" is the sequel. I will be revising and uploading it next.


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